Dusk's Crown
by AngeloHeroOfLight
Summary: He's lost his love to forces he can't explain. They want him for reasons he can't even begin to comprehend. Can he save what he loves the most or will they both be lost forever. Hearts are dreams will connect in this world filled with darkness and beauty.
1. Chapter 1

Dusk's Crown

**Welcome to Dusk's Crown! Brought to you by (very obvious author). This is my first fanfic in the Pokemon genre and if you have read my other fanfic this will have a different flavor than that.**

**But either way I think it'll be a very fun experience and I am really excited to start this.**

**This pairing has been with me for a while and now it lives! Hahaha! It's a Serperior/Darkrai pairing. M/M, don't like, don't read.**

**I call this pairing DarkRoyaltyShipping. All Pokemon will be anthropomorphic also known as pokemorphs.**

**I own nothing but the credit for probably making DarkRoyaltyShipping, all else is Pokémon's.**

**So no more excuses, now we start! **

_Prologue _

_"I don't want this!" he yelled in my face. He was breathing heavily and looked like he was close to tears._

_"Really?" I said putting a hand on my hip "Because I think you've proven me otherwise." my comment just seemed to get him angrier._

_"I never asked for this!" he screamed in his deep voice, he started pacing around the dark clearing with his dark robe and flowing white hair following behind him "I don't want to be trapped like this!" _

_"What are you trapped in!" I yelled walking up to him. "I'm not forcing you to do anything!"_

_I stepped into the clearing and almost forgot to be mad. The moon was shining through the trees, lightning the forest with rays of silver that seemed to dance around him beautifully, making his tall well built frame look so . . . stop it!_

_He glared at me with glossy eyes, his hands shaking in either rage or extreme sadness. He sharply turned around and destroyed a tree with a Shadow Ball._

_"Great, because that helps." I said sarcastically. He turned back around and looked like he was about to say something but stopped when his eyes locked with my red ones._

_"I don't want to be stuck with a damn kid!" he said harshly, he turned around to face the moon._

_His words hit me full on._

_"Well at least now I know what you think of me." I said with clear hurt in my voice. I turned on my heel and started walking, I was ready to get out of that damn clearing._

_I felt something gently grab the cloak on my back, of course I knew who it was but I didn't turn around. I wasn't giving him that._

_"I'm sorry." he said softly. I was surprised, I'd never heard him say that to anyone. I felt him his arms wrap around me, I was in the process of complete shock and trying not to melt._

_I felt him take a big breath. I gave a mental chuckle, he never was much of a talker._

_"I-I don't want to hurt you." he said finally. I could hear the weight that he put into the words._

_I turned around to face him and looked up to see those brilliant blue eyes of his._

_"Don't worry." I said giving him a smile to try and calm him "I trust you."_

_His eyes narrowed and he shook his head._

_"I'm not worried about you," his voice and eyes dropped,"its me."_

_I put my paw on his face and gently moved his head up._

_"Why would you be afraid of hurting me?" I asked softly. He closed his eyes and let go of me. He took a small step back _

_"I'm the Nightmare Pokemon, I'm the reason why children fear the dark, why people are afraid to go to sleep. I cause pain, I cause suffering and fear." He took another step back "Not only in dreams."_

_"I don't want to hurt you because I," he cut himself off, he sighed and continued "I am a being from darkness, there's nothing you could see in me."_

_I closed the small distance between us and wrapped my arms around him. I looked into those blue eyes I loved, knowing fully well what I wanted._

_"Beauty can come from darkness." I whispered in his ear._

_**Drsdrsdrsdrsdrsdrsdrsdrsdrs**_

"You could've done a better job tying me down." a Serperior said to his three captors.

In middle of the forest the Serperior was tied down to a rocky ledge with three chains that were merged into the rocks.

"Can someone shut him up before I kill him!" a Mightyena yelled, he was running his hands through his black and grey fur his red eyes wide with fury.

"You will do no such thing," a Mismagius said on the other side of the clearing, he was checking the groups supplies "we were clearly instructed to bring him alive."

"But why!" the Mightyena whined, someone chuckled on the other side of the camp.

"Calm down Ren," a Scizor smirked. He was the closest to the Serperior and the one keeping guard "Don't get your tail in a knot."

"Dont say my name!" Ren yelled, he tried to glare at the Scizor but the sun was shining off his red metal armor making him look away "Damn hide in the shade or something Kaven."

Kaven chuckled at his companion and shifted his attention to the Mismagius.

"So _Nix_," Kaven smirked stretching the name "How're we doing on supplies?"

Nix smiled and shook his head, he closed the chest where the supplies were kept and walked towards Ren.

"We should have enough for a long time," Nix said, a breeze brushed through the clearing making the Mismagius' purple and pink robe flow against the wind "We have nothing to worry about."

"Yeah, if these guys actually show up." Ren muttered under his breath. The three had been holed up in the forest's clearing for almost two hours, they're clients were supposed to come _three_ hours ago.

Nix sighed his discontent, he grabbed his hat when a rather big wind blew.

"It has been far to long." Nix said sourly. He turned towards the Serperior and glared at the grass type.

The Serperior glared right back. The ghost type jumped back in fear and the Serperior gave a small smile.

"Imbecile Serperiors and their infuriating glare." Nix muttered walking away from the camp.

Kaven got up from a tree he had been leaning on and walked over to the grass type.

"So what's your name?" Kaven asked. The Serperior raised an eyebrow on a bored expression.

"Do you really care?" he asked the steel type. Kaven shrugged his shoulders and stretched his wings.

"Just making conversation." he told the Serperior. The grass type had an expression that Kaven couldn't read. Finally the Serperior gave a small smile.

"Seven," he said bowing his head slightly "Nice to meet ya." Seven looked back up and locked into Kaven's yellow eyes.

"That's what I would've said if i wasn't tied to a rocky cliff in the the forest circumstances." Seven accused. Kaven laughed and retracted his wings.

"What do we do with the kid if they don't show up?" Ren asked his companions. The three of them exchanged a look between then

They walked away from Seven so that he couldn't hear their conversation. Once they thought they were far enough they grouped together.

"There is not much we can do, letting him go is not a good option." Nix scratched his chin "If they find him then we will be in serious trouble."

"Slave trade is definitely out of the question." Kaven said somberly.

The other two nodded, none of them liked slave trade. They turned around to look at Seven who had his head up to the sky.

"It sure is sunny today." Seven said out loud, the sun was almost setting but it was still sunny.

Ren grabbed his collar and started fanning himself.

"The kids right," Ren wiped his forehead "These people better come soon so they can take him and leave."

"Sorry guys," Seven said from the rocky ledge "But I'm anywhere."

Seven's gold markings lit up, he flicked his left hand and a Solarbeam crashed into the trio.

They were sent a few feet back, Ren fell to the ground but Nix and Kaven landed on their feet.

Seven flicked his right hand and a leaf blade appeared. He swung the blade upwards and broke the chains restraining him in a single swipe.

"Told you could've done a better job." Seven smirked, he spun and pointed his sword at the trio.

Ren rolled onto all fours and shot towards Seven. Ren swiped Seven with his claws twice and then kicked him in the chest.

Seven staggered back, he glared at Ren making him flinch. The grass type spun and raised a heap of leaves into the air, he pointed his sword at Ren and unleashed his Leaf Storm.

The storm engulfed Ren and sent him back a couple meters.

"Kaven." Nix ordered, the Scizor nodded and quickly dashed forward to take Ren's place.

He swung his hands and his metal claws enveloped them. He swung again with his claw as Seven used his sword to block the attack.

They parried until Seven was hit with a Mystical Fire, Seven cried out as the flames struck him.

Kaven moved up and gave Seven a head on uppercut. The Serperior fell to the ground seemingly unconscious.

Kaven walked up to him slowly and nudged him with his foot.

"That was anticlimactic." Kaven joked. Nix smiled but his eyes widened.

"Watch out!" Nix yelled, Kaven turned around to a smirking Serperior whose gold markings were glowing, a gold sphere appeared in his hand and the golden beam shot out.

The Solarbeam hit Kaven on the chest sending him flying. Seven got up shakily and ran towards Nix.

The ghost type raised his hands and shot repeated Mystical Fires and Shadow Balls, Seven dodged most of them, but got scared scraped by one.

He stepped in front of Nix and swung his sword repeatedly. Nix dodged all the sword strikes.

Seven huffed in annoyance and started swinging again. This time he managed to get knick Nix's leg making the ghost fall.

Seven grabbed Nix by the throat and used Giga Drain. A green glow enveloped Seven and Nix as the grass type took Nix's health.

"Nix!" Ren yelled rushing forward, he pushed Seven off his partner and used Dark Pulse. It knocked Seven back but it also hit Nix in the face.

The Mismagius cried out in pain and landed heavily on the ground.

"Nix!" Ren cried out kneeling down next to Nix "I'm sorry!"

Nix waved him off and pointed to the Serperior who was now in battle with Kaven. Ren nodded and charged one more time to attack.

Seven sparred with Kaven, the grass type slashed and whirled against the metal bugs straightforward technique. His blade ricocheting against Kaven's claws.

Seven saw Ren running up to them. He blasted a Solarbeam to distract Kaven then turned back to Ren and glared.

Ren yipped and tripped on his own feet.

"Shit!" he yelled as he fell down. Kaven came back and used X-Scissor on Seven's chest, it was a critical hit.

The Scizor put his foot on Seven and raised his claw for the finishing blow.

Seven smirked and grabbed Kaven's leg and engulfed him in a green glow. The metal type yelled out in agony as his health was being sucked out of him.

Ren ran up and tackled Kaven out of Seven's reach. Ren rolled on the ground as Kaven struggled getting up.

"Why are you fighting?!" Ren yelled. Seven picked up his sword from the ground, he staggered to get up, even with the extra health.

"I don't want you guys getting hurt." Seven said, he pointed his sword at the ground.

"You could've fooled me." Kaven muttered painfully, he drew in a sharp breath as he tried to move.

Ren saw something move in the corner of his eye. It was Nix and he was slowly getting up and getting ready to attack again.

"Trust me I'm saving you from something that you don't want to be a part of," he raised his sword and summoned another Leaf Storm "You'll thank me later."

Nix shot a Mystical Fire into the barrage of leaves. The fire enveloped the leaves and Seven screamed murder from inside the fire.

The fire continued to blaze a couple of seconds after the scream faded away.

The group walked towards the fire, Kaven was leaning on Ren and Nix was grabbing his side.

"Did we kill him?" Ren asked nervously. The three looked at each other with nervous glances.

The fire started shifting and become erratic, the mass of flames started rolling and spinning wildly.

Seven yelled from inside the fire and the burning leaves rushed forward into Ren and Kaven.

Kaven and Ren disappeared with a scream into the fire and Seven reappeared, burn marks decorating his body and his eyes showing intense determination.

The leaves died out to reveal the duo, Kaven had fainted and Ren wasn't doing so good.

Nix sent a Shadow Ball hitting Seven in the back, the grass type fell to his knees and almost fainted.

"You're not going to stop me!" Seven yelled getting up shakily staring straight at Nix "I wont let you!"

He aimed one hand at Nix and the other at Ren. His markings started glowing gold but the sun was now setting and the move needed to charge. Ren and Nix saw the opportunity.

Ren charged and Nix readied a Thunder, they were trying to lay the finishing strike.

Seven yelled and released two beams of light, the Solarbeams rammed into Ren and Nix who had both been about to attack.

Ren slammed into a tree and fainted while the Mismagius was on the ground.

Seven raised his left arm and aimed it at Nix. The ghost used the last of his strength and released the lightning from the dark clouds that had formed above Seven.

Seven yelled in agony as the lightning struck his body. He fell heavily to the ground, a loud gasp escaped him as he made contact with the ground.

Seven lay on the ground facing upwards and panting heavily, he turned his head painfully to look at Nix. Thankfully he had fainted.

_I cant stay here_ Seven thought through his headache _they'll find me._

With the last of his strength he flipped himself over, he cried out in pain and ignored he darkening of his vision.

He dragged himself into the trees, every muscle begging for him to stop. He was panting heavily and his vision was fading even more.

Seven was close to the tree line when his body gave up.

"No." Seven wailed softly "I can't give~" his head banged against the ground and he lost consciousness.

**So I am aware that some of you are thinking "What the hell, you took the story out of nowhere!" Others are like "The story was taken down?"**

**Well my answer to that is yes the story was taken down BECAUSE I thought this story could do much better so I decided to make it better by editing.**

**All the OCs that were accepted will still be in and OCs are still be accepted. **

**Here's the form**

**Name:**

**Species: **

**Shiny?:**

**Age:**

**Gender:**

**Sexuality:**

**Ability:**

**Moves: **

**Personality:**

**Job/Profession:**

**Anything special:**

**If you feel like I missed something go ahead and put it in, I accept PM and review.**

**Also I'm starting something new, its a questioner for you guys. You guys can ask me or the cast (characters) anything and we'll answer. It didn't matter it's a main character or not, just ask.**

**To all you Tales of a Green Zangoose fans there will be a certain Nidoking next chapter.**


	2. Chapter 2: Gotta a Secret

Dusk's Crown Chapter 2: Gotta a Secret.

**Hello again my readers. Glad to see you came back, in this chapter we meet new characters and learn more about our Seven's predicament.**

**And to anyone who came because of Tales of a Green Zangoose for a certain poison type, I got you. (By the way check out that story Virgofox28)**

**Let's see if anyone died! Kidding, maybe.**

Seven groaned in pain as he woke up, his head was pounding and his body cried out at every little movement. He was also having trouble opening his eyes.

He tried getting up but cried out and hit the rock behind him, he- wait rock?

Seven tried opening his eyes again, they opened slightly and he could see that he was sitting down; not sprawled out on the ground like he remembered.

He moved his head and hissed sharply at the pain, he clawed the ground and tried to muffle his grunts.

"Hold still!" a voice cried out, Seven felt a paw on his head increasing his pain.

"Ah!" Seven yelled biting his lower lip. The Pokemon removed its paw quickly.

"I'm sorry!" the voice said. The grass type tried opening his eyes more but couldn't see anything except for nine luminescent blue balls of fire swishing in the moonlight. "Stop moving, you're hurting yourself."

_It's a girl_ Seven thought relaxing a little _its probably not them, but . . ._

"Darn it!" the voice said. There was a bright flash of red and a bitter smell of smoke filled the air. Seven coughed loudly as the bitter smoke entered his lungs.

He felt his headache eased a little and after a little effort finally got his eyes to open fully. At first he still couldn't find anybody but saw the moonbeams shift spastically. He squinted his eyes and noticed that the moonbeams were actually the fur of a Pokemon.

"Where am I?" Seven asked hoarsely. The silver Pokemon jumped in surprise and turned to Seven.

"You're awake?!" she asked surprised, Seven responded by moaning slightly in pain. The silver Pokemon smiled slightly, she moved her hands slowly and gingerly picked up a herb. She moved the herb to Seven's mouth, the snake turned his head away from the plant in his face.

"Here," the silver Pokemon grabbed Seven's head gently "You need this to feel better."

Seven stared at the the Pokemon next to him, the nine blue fireballs weren't actually fireballs but the tips to nine silver tails. These trails behind to the shiny Ninetails that was staring at him sternly.

Seven opened his mouth, the Ninetails put the herb in his mouth. Seven bit down and gagged at the bitter taste.

"Keep eating," the silver fox said softly "You'll feel better."

Seven reluctantly chewed on the herb and amazingly started feeling better immediately. He grabbed the rock behind him and started to slowly move himself up.

"Do you feel like you're ready to get up?" the Ninetails asked worriedly. Seven grunted and managed to get up, he leaned on the rock and looked at the the silver Pokemon.

"I don't really have a choice if I'm ready or not," Seven said pushing himself up "I need to get moving."

"Are you sure?" the Ninetails asked nervously. Seven nodded and started walking slowly but staggeringly "Do you need help?"

Seven stopped and turned at the Ninetails.

"What's your name?" he asked, the Ninetails looked down and put her hands behind her back.

"I'm Roxy." she said softly. Seven nodded and grabbed onto tree for balance.

"Do you know where Alperia is?" Seven asked grabbing his forehead "I need find someone who can help me."

"I know a little about medicine," Roxy offered "And I live in Alperia, I can help you get over there and,"

"You don't want to do that." Seven cut her off "I'd rather you don't."

The silver fox recoiled, she lowered her head and put her hands together. Seven looked back to see the Ninetails and instantly felt bad.

"I'm sorry," Seven said limping towards the fox "What's your name?"

"Roxy," she said looking up shyly. Seven flashed a small smile, he put his paw on her shoulder and gave it a small squeeze.

"Roxy," Seven repeated "Thank you, for everything, I probably wouldn't have made it if it wasn't for you and because I'm thankful I've decided to leave you out of this." Seven gave her shoulder another squeeze and turned around "You'll thank me later."

"But I can help!" Roxy cried out as Seven walked away "You won't make it through the forest at night!"

Roxy caught up with the Serperior after he had traveled a fair distance.

"Why won't you let me help?" she asked. Seven kept walking but was thinking his next words carefully.

"Their are people after me, but I'm not a criminal," Seven added quickly "They think that if they get me that they'll have the upper hand."

"On what?" Roxy asked, Seven gave her a quick glance.

"So I'm out here trying to avoid those creeps and," Seven changed the topic "Find anything useful."

"So why'd you come into the forest?" Roxy asked "You could've just as easily gone through the main road and it's a lot safer."

Seven gave a small laugh and almost tripped on a branch on the process

"Careful.".Roxy said reaching out for Seven.

"Thanks," the grass type murmured "Well if you really want to know I was kidnapped on the main road, then I woke up chained down to rocky cliff."

"That's horrible, that's why you're all beat up right?" the fox asked worriedly. Seven nodded again and they continued in silence.

"Can I ask a question?" Roxy asked after a few minutes I silence.

"You just did," Seven smiled at Roxy's surprised face "I'm kidding, go ahead."

Roxy gave a nervous chuckle and cleared her throat.

"If there's people after you then why are you telling me this?" she asked. A sad smile appeared on Seven's face, he slowly stopped and held out a hand to say 'wait' while he leaned on a tree.

"Here," Roxy reached into the much on her hip and pulled out another herb. Seven grimaced but grabbed the herb and reluctantly bit into the plant.

He avoided trying to spit out the bitter plant and the urge to vomit when he swallowed it. Seven pushed himself off the tree and surprised himself when he noticed his limp was gone.

Roxy giggled at Seven's expression.

"It's an Energy Root," she said through giggles "Pretty good right?"

"Other than the taste yeah," Seven tested his steps and slowly started walking normally "So you asked why I'm trusting you so much?"

Roxy nodded but stayed silent, she didn't want to interrupt.

"Well," Seven sighed and closed his eyes "You're a girl for one."

"What?" Roxy asked offended. Seven waved her off with a small chuckle.

"Sorry I realized how that sounded, what I meant is that the people chasing me only have one girl and you're nothing like her." Seven stopped as Roxy pulled on his arm and motioned for him to turn.

"Plus you're a shiny," he continued "They love shinies, but only for slave trade so that's two strikes against you, being against me."

"They sound bad, slave trade is a pretty serious thing." Roxy said softly, Seven nodded and turned again at Roxy's signal.

"They're the worst," Seven said with clear hate "I'm just giving you the briefest explanation." he stopped and turned to Roxy "I pray to Arceus that you never have meet them."

Roxy shuddered visibly. She was about to say something when her tails fell and she immediately froze.

"What's wrong?" Seven whispered looking through the trees. Roxy pointed at the treetops, Seven grabbed the Ninetails' hand and hid them behind a tree.

The grass type peered over the tree, there were two Pokemon that he could see in the trees.

_There could be more_ Seven thought _I don't think I'm ready to fight yet._

"What do we do?" Roxy grabbed Seven's arm. He turned to Roxy's scared face, he smiled to comfort the Ninetails. Seven turned his attention back to the two Pokemon, he focused more on them and started to hear them speaking quietly.

"We need to get them Null." one of the Pokemon.

"I know but I don't want them to see us." the other voice said. Seven glared and summoned his Leaf Blade, he was almost certain that they were talking about him and Roxy.

"We're going to surprise attack them," Seven told Roxy, her eyes widened and her mouth fell open.

"But I don't know how to." Seven covered Roxy's mouth, he raised his other hand and with his eyes asked if Roxy was ready. The Ninetails closed her eyes but nodded, Seven gently removed his hand and raised three fingers. He quickly counted down and ran through the trees.

"But I'm hungry." the first voice said loudly, Seven heard a loud sigh and something drop down from the trees.

"I know Void but like I said I don't want the townsfolk to see us." the voice was a Ninjask woman who was straight in Seven's path.

Seven skidded to a halt right in front of the Ninjask. The bug blinked in surprise but made no move. Seven smiled sheepishly, he was about to say something when Roxy screamed.

She was running with her head down and screaming a battle charge. The fox crashed into Seven who crashed into the Ninjask.

"Get off _now_." the Ninjask threatened. Roxy immediately got up and hid behind a tree, Seven got up slower and offered a hand to the Ninjask. The bug looked at the hand and swatted it away, she propped herself up and dusted the grass off her.

The grass type heard the second Pokemon jump from the trees, before Seven could turn around he was tackled to the ground. Roxy let out a slight gasp and the Ninjask only sighed in exasperation.

"A new friend!" the body on top of Seven squealed, it's brown skin was hard to make out in the darkness but it was obviously a Shedninja.

"Hi." Seven smiled widely. The Shedninja squealed and picked Seven up, once he was up she grabbed both his hands and started spinning the snake around.

"A new friend who doesn't run away!" the bug yelled happily, Seven laughed and fell to the ground when the Shedninja let go.

"Void!" the Ninjask hissed, she walked up to Void and grabbed her by the arm "Don't talk to them!"

"Why not?" Void asked crossed "They seem nice."

"Seem is a different thing than _are_." the Ninjask spat. Void's empty eyes narrowed at her partner.

"Sorry about my sister, she's Null and mean," Void said bluntly "But she's occasionally nice." Null scoffed and faced away from the rest of them.

"It's okay, I'm Seven this is Roxy," Seven said still smiling "We just wanted to pass through." he turned back and motioned for Roxy to walk up to them.

The Ninetails walked shyly towards Seven and Void, the later gasped softly at Roxy.

"I've never seen a shiny Ninetails," Void said excitedly "You're so pretty!" she grabbed the fox by the hands and spun her around. Roxy yelped softly but let Void do her thing. Once the bug type had let go Roxy yelped again as she fell backwards, Seven caught her by the shoulders and pushed her up.

"Careful there." he said, Roxy nodded slightly flustered. Null coughed loudly grabbing everyone's attention.

"If you want to leave," Null bowed mockingly "Then go." Seven glared at Null making her flinch.

"Just so you know I'm not royalty." Seven said sticking out his tongue, further proving his point. He turned around again and walked into the flurry of trees.

"Bye." Roxy said softly. She waved quickly then followed Seven into the trees. The fox caught up to Seven who was now walking at a face pace.

"Slow down!" Roxy cried out, Seven stopped to wait for the fire type. Once she caught up Seven started walking again at a slower pace.

"Sorry, I guess I forgot my speed is higher than others." Seven apologized to the panting Ninetails. He stopped again to let Roxy catch her breath, while he waited he leaned on a tree to relax a little bit. Seven took in his surroundings, they'd been walking for a while and the trees still seemed endless.

He was about to slump down when he noticed the moonlight in the distance.

"Hey Roxy is Alperia close?" Seven got up quickly, Roxy nodded and stood up straight.

"Yeah it's close, we just have to pass the light there and, Seven wait!" Roxy cried out, the grass type had only heard 'pass the light' and made a full sprint to the cliff.

Seven quickly passed the clearing and gasped at the site before him. He was on a huge cliff at the edge of the forest but the site ahead of him left him shocked.

The city had high walls surrounding most of the buildings so only a few poked up at the top, but what had him hypnotized were the paintings on the large walls. They were giant depictions of Pokemon, legendary and regular, all together dancing and laughing around the city. The paintings caught the moonlight in their grasps and seem to sparkle and shine through the night.

Seven didn't notice when Roxy slowly dragged herself next to him, she grabbed his leg and Seven slowly blinked back into reality.

"Oh when did you get here?" he asked the panting Ninetails. Roxy panted and looked at Seven with a incredulous expression.

"You left me in the middle of the woods!" she cried out "I could've died!" Seven recoiled with guilt and looked down in shame.

"I'm sorry." he said softly. His shoulders slumped down and he looked away. Roxy's face turned into a surprised expression, she got up and grabbed Seven's shoulder.

"Hey I was kidding," she reassured "I didn't mean it." Seven looked at Roxy and smiled sadly.

"I'm sorry, it's just that death isn't something I like playing with." he explained. Seven walked towards the edge of the cliff and sat down.

"Is it the people chasing you?" Roxy asked sitting next to Seven, the snake closed his eyes and nodded. He sighed deeply and opened his eyes that were lost in thought. Roxy didn't want to interrupt his thoughts but it was close to midnight.

"We should get going," she said softly, Seven didn't respond for a couple minutes but nodded "The only thing is that the doors to the city are gonna close soon."

Seven cursed under his breath and got up to start walking down the cliff.

"That's gonna take to long," Roxy said stopping Seven "I have a better way."

She walked towards the grass type and stood facing him and the city.

"Revenge sucka." Roxy said evilly, she put her hand on his chest and pushed him off the cliff.

_**LineBreakLineBreakLineBreak**_

A slightly bruised Seven and a joyful Roxy walked into the city as a pair of giant doors shut behind them.

"You could've told me there was a net at the bottom." Seven brushed off some dirt off his clothes. Roxy giggled and walked in front of the Serperior.

"Welcome to Alperia!" she spun dramatically with her arms spread open "The Marble City of Magic!"

Seven chuckled and clapped softly, he walked up to the bowing Ninetails.

"What happened to the Roxy I knew?" Seven tapped the vulpine on the head "Is she under Hypnosis?" Roxy laughed through her blush.

"I guess I'm just happy that I'm back at Alperia," she smiled and looked at Seven shyly "And have a new friend?"

Seven smiled at the Ninetails' way of asking if they were friends. He held out his arm for Roxy, she was about to shake his hand but Seven shook his head. He grabbed Roxy's hand and made her grab his upper arm then he proceeded to grab her upper arm.

"Now we shake." Seven said with a smile. He shook his entire arm causing the silver fox more confusion.

"What was that?" she asked tilting her head. Seven laughed and let go of Roxy's arm.

"You'll find out later, shouldn't you get home?" he asked Roxy. The vulpine changed from a calm to panic state so fast that Seven almost missed it.

"My parents!" she screeched "I was supposed to get home hours ago!"

She pushed past Seven and started running into the buildings.

"Wait what am I supposed to do!" Seven cried out in panic. Roxy stopped fast and ran back towards Seven.

"Meet me tomorrow at the clock tower!" she said quickly. The shiny ran again and disappeared into the high mass of buildings.

"But what am I supposed do now!" he yelled at Roxy, this time she didn't turn back. Seven was about to chase after her but stopped when he turned the corner, there were so many buildings and turns that he'd get lost if took one more step.

Seven sighed and walked back to the main gate. He walked passed multiple alleys but in one of them a hand shot out of the darkness and pulled Seven in.

He was about to scream when the hand wrapped itself around his mouth. Seven kicked his assailant making them let go. He tried to run out of the alley but the figure reached out again with both hands and pinned Seven against the wall.

Seven was about to yell when his attacker finally spoke.

"Kid calm down it's me!" Null hissed making Seven stop mid scream "Arceus you're stupid."

"You shouldn't say things like that if you want his help." Void appeared out of nowhere, still wearing her ever present smile. Null responded by scoffing and letting go of Seven.

"Why would you do something like this?" Seven asked, Null gave a harsh laugh and turned around.

"Because we need you _help_," she said mockingly "I thought you were paying attention." Seven glared making Null shut up.

"What I meant was why did you pull me here when you could've just asked me." Seven crossed his arms "Like a normal person."

Void responded by giving a sheepish smile but Null walked away without glancing back.

"Null!" Void cried out "Don't walk away!"

"Find me when you're done." she said simply. The bug rounded a corner and disappeared into the mess of buildings. Void sighed softly and focused back on Seven.

"Well like Null said we kind of need your help," the Shedninja pulled a list from the pack on her leg and extended it to Seven "We need to get some stuff and most of them we can get outside the city but there's one we need here."

Seven took the list and read though it. Almost everything was crossed out except for the last item on the list.

"You need Coulbur berries?" Seven asked for reassurance, Void nodded and gestured to the city.

"There's a berry shop open at night so you can pick up now but me and Null aren't going to be in the city," Void explained "We're going somewhere else but then we're coming back to the cliffs at three in the afternoon, sound good?"

Seven nodded and put the list in his pocket when he looked up Void pushed a small pack of poke dollars in front of him.

"This should cover it," she smiled. Void turned around and walked away, she waved goodbye and turned the same corner that Null had.

Leaving Seven alone, again.

The grass type sighed walking out of the alley, he looked around but there was still no one in sight.

_I'd better find a place with people for directions_ Seven thought to himself Since Void didn't tell me where to go.

"A place where lots of people gather at night," Seven started pacing "Where could that be?" he took a couple more steps then mentally face palmed.

Seven took his first steps into Alperia looking for a bar.

_**LineBreakLineBreakLineBreak**_

Seven opened the door to a local bar and almost threw up, he moved back and slammed the door. He drew deep breaths as he was trying not to heave his stomach. The bar reeked of alcohol and sweat, and he had barely walked in.

"Just go in there, ask for directions, get out." Seven whispered to himself. He stood up straight and opened the door again, resisting the urge to slam the door again he walked into the drunk infested bar and looked for someone sober enough to give directions.

After ten minutes he had almost been crushed by an unconscious Lucario, ignored the advances of a Purrloin, and broke up a fight between a Pyroar and a Rhyperior.

Seven slumped down in a nearby booth and put his hand between his head.

_I haven't even been here for ten minutes_! he cried out in his thoughts. Seven took his head out of his hands and frowned at the scene in front of him. He thought it was so stupid that people wanted to get this drunk just for cheap memories they won't remember and a killer headache in the morning.

_To each his own_ Seven sighed. He got up and decided to give it one more try, the grass type walked into the bar and a Spinda landed on Seven.

"You're drunk," Seven deadpanned while catching the bear, he pushed the Spinda up just to see him walk away "You should probably stop drinking."

"I'm not bweven dwunk," the Spinda slurred, he kept crashing and bumping into other customers "Spinda's blaways walk bike thish."

The bear tripped on his own feet and fell face first against the floor.

"Okay mwaybe I'm a wittle dwunk." the Spinda's head fell on the floor and fell unconscious. Seven fought the urge to facepalm or sigh. He looked back at the Spinda but noticed something in the area in front of the Spinda.

There was a Nidoking sitting at the bar and unlike everyone else wasn't acting like an idiot. If he didn't have directions Seven would leave.

He walked up to the Nidoking and sat down next to him.

"Hi." Seven said, the Nidoking gave him a sideways glance then went back to drinking from the brown bottle in his hand. Seven looked at the bottle and the Nidoking as if they were new species.

"I was wondering if you knew where the berry shop was?" Seven tried again. The poison type took another swig from his bottle, he grimaced and turned towards Seven.

"Fuck off." the Nidoking said, Seven glared but it went unnoticed, he got up and took the bottle from the poison type.

"You shouldn't be drinking." Seven said as if he were getting after a child. The Nidoking stood up slightly towering over Seven.

"I think you should mind your own business." the Nidoking took the bottle back and scowled at the grass type. Seven crossed his arms and shook his head.

"Do you think they want to see you like this?" Seven accused. The Nidoking slammed the bottle down and grabbed his head.

"What do you want!" he said though his teeth, Seven ignored hid question and nodded his head toward the beer.

"Do you think the person that you're drinking for wants to see you like this?" Seven asked, the purple Pokemon got up and grabbed the hem of his shirt.

"What did you say?" the Nidoking said more as a threat than a question. Seven stared him back in the eye without blinking.

"You heard me," Seven stood his ground "There's a difference between drinking and drinking for someone, and you're drinking for someone so I said 'so you think that person would want to see you like this'."

The Nidoking pushed Seven back and pointed at the door.

"Get out." he ordered. Seven stared at the Nidoking with a sad smile the walked away without another word.

The Nidoking sat down and stared at the bottle in his hand. He tried not to think what the Serperior had said but soon he was thinking of his Zangoose.

"Aladar." the Nidoking let a rouge tear fall.

_**LineBreakLineBreakLineBreak**_

Seven breathed in the fresh air greedily, with all the stench in the bar he wouldn't be surprised if _he_ was drunk.

He had left the bar about ten minutes ago but was still in the front.

_No point getting lost_ Seven reasoned with himself. He opened his eyes and looked at the barren street he was in. He still didn't have the directions he needed.

"I got _dwunk_ for nothing." Seven joked making himself laugh. He was deciding whether or not to actually lwave when the door to the bar opened.

Seven cast an irritated glance at the door, he hadn't been fond of anyone in that bar.

The Nidoking stepped out of the bar and stopped when he caught sight of Seven.

"Hey," the poison type said softly while closing the door. Seven crossed his arms without taking his gaze off of the Nidoking.

"I'm Michael." the Nidoking said extending his hand, Seven quickly looked at the hand then back at Michael.

Seven uncrossed his arms and shook Michael's hand.

"That berry shop you wanted is two streets down and a left." Michael pointed down the street. Seven nodded and started walking.

"Thanks." he said over his shoulder. Seven continued walking and soon was out of Michael's line of sight.

"No problem kid." he glared at the bar and spat on the door. He groaned as he started walking away.

Seven soon got to the berry shop which wasn't hard to find thanks to the giant sign outside the shop.

"Exodus' Wonderful Berry Shop." Seven read out loud, he shrugged and pushed the door opened.

Seven yelped in surprise as light flooded his vision, once his eyes adjusted he saw that the entire store was lit as if it was the afternoon. He looked back outside and it was still nighttime.

"Close the door sir." a voice said inside the shop, a shadow zoomed next to Seven. A ghost emerged from the shadow and closed the door. "Exodus, owner of Exodus' Wonderful Berry Shop."

The ghost type was a Gengar sporting the classic wide smile, but this one seemed genuine.

"Nice to meet you I'm Seven." the Serperior smiled, he took out the list from his pocket and showed it to Exodus'.

"I need a Coulbur Berry, two actually." Seven told him, Exodus checked the list and nodded.

"Three stalls down and to the left." Exodus said. Seven said thanks and went down the isles. The store was amazing, it could have easily passed for a berry museum.

"Here we go." Seven murmured to himself, he read the sign that read Coulbur berry. He smiled until he saw the actual berry, he gingerly grabbed the berry and gave a small smile.

"You jerk," Seven laughed softly, he put to the berry to his chest and gave a content sigh "We have some things to talk about when you get back."

He went to the counter and bought three Colbur berries, one more than he needed to. He thanked Exodus and left the shop with the berries in the sack that Void gave him.

"How come it's bright?" Seven decided to ask making Exodus laughed.

"Well since I'm a ghost in mostly nocturnal so when I wake up everyone's asleep and it was weird adjusting to that." the ghost said "So I made a spell that changes time in here!"

Seven gave an awkward smile and his left eye twitched.

_Is that really the best way?_ Seven thought. He decided to ignore the shopekeepers ideology, said farewell and walked out of the shop

After walking for a few minutes Seven stepped into a square that had a fountain in it, he smiled and sat down at the edge. He huffed and looked at the city for what looked liked the millionth time.

Being on the run messed ones sleeping schedule, he wasn't sleepy right now but that was a problem considering no one else was awake.

He closed his eyes and listened to the soothing water from the fountain. Seven ran through the day's event in his head and gave a crooked smile.

"At least today was better than when I was trapped in that fire type cave." Seven sighed and opened his eyes.

The world was dead.

_**LineBreakLineBreakLineBreak**_

That was the best way he could describe it.

A bloody sky looked over the broken city. The cracked windows, broken walls and crumbling sidewalk gave no indication to the blood spattered throughout the town.

Seven got up and felt something sticky on his hands, he raised them and found then covered in blood. He turned around to see the fountain was slowly leaking blood.

Seven shuddered and walked away from the bloody fountain. The scene around him gave him intense chills.

He held himself as he walked through the monstrous city, searching for any signs of life.

Seven walked through the city as the world kept crumbling around him, he rounded a corner and stopped in his tracks as he saw a clock tower.

Dark shadows danced around the ebony clock tower, blood was raining from the sky and was running down the streets almost at his feet.

"No thank you." Seven said to himself, he prepared to turn himself around but stop at the black abyss behind him. The rest of the city had disappeared behind him, he took a careful step forward and part of the city fell into the abyss.

Seven closed his eyes and grabbed his temple.

"Of course." he muttered to himself. He took a deep breath and stepped into the blood that pooled in the street. Seven shivered and avoided going back, not that he had a choice.

He took another breath and splashed his way through the bloody streets.

Seven made it to the front of the clock tower and was drenched the color red, he could pass off as a shiny. But who ever heard of an odd colored shiny?

Seven shook himself out of his thoughts, the blood was more of an annoyance now than anything. The shadows he had seen were ghosts, actual spirits.

They spun around the clock tower in a violent storm that he realized that it wasn't blood, it was falling out of the spirits in cascades.

Seven was about to move again when the city started shaking, the spirits all flew up into the crimson sky and the city started crumbling without Seven moving.

He started running forward and panicked even more when he saw that the other side of the city was crumbling to. Seven reached the clock tower and pressed his back against the wall, he crouches to the ground and closed his eyes waiting for the inevitable.

After a while opened his eyes after not falling to his demise. There was a space of around fifteen surrounding the clock tower on all sides.

Seven got up and was surprised that his bloody hand hadn't made him fall, because it wasn't bloody anymore. He checked himself all over and realized that the blood was completely gone.

"What the," Seven wondered out loud, he was cut off as something glowed behind him. He turned around and stopped inches from the edge.

Eighteen different colored spheres were in a giant circle, thin threads extended from each circle and met at a single figure.

A single black crown.

Seven stepped forward and reached out to to touch the black enigma. He fingers touched the surprisingly warm symbol.

"What is this?" Seven wondered out loud.

"Seven." a deep voice whispered behind him.

**Hi guys nice to see your finally finished reading, took you long enough, kidding. . . for some of you.**

**I'm a so happy that this story is finally coming together, to those of you wondering where the shipping is I tell you. Calm down the plot is important to. There will be enough lovey dovey in the future.**

**And our Nidoking appeared yay! Will he appear more I dont know, well I do but I'm not telling you.**

**But getting to the serious point. People chasing the protagonist? Dark alternate realities? Cliffhangers! What does it all mean! (This is what happens when I'm hyper)**

**If you're as confused as the Spinda in the bar then I dare you to scream, no matter where you are. Go!**

**Well nothing left to say but bye!**


	3. Chapter 3: Let the Nightmare Begin

Dusk's Crown Chapter 3: Let the Nightmare Begin.

**Chapter three, three, three! I said three times because it's the number three, get it . . . I'll stop.**

**By the way I put together a little AU one shot of this story, you guys can check that out or not. **

**I'm getting into link battles and trading now, not really good yet but I refuse to give up! I will improve! So if anyone wants to fight or trade then send me your friend code through PM. No reviews I wont accept it, reviews are for reviews.**

**And here we go.**

Seven opened his eyes and gasped. He moved back but he met with air and he fell into the dark, endless, water?

He resurfaced and coughed the water out of his system. He was at the fountain from earlier but the water wasn't blood anymore.

_What happened?_ Seven wondered grabbing his head in response to the headache that was starting to form.

"Hey kid, what're you doing?" asked a familiar voice. Seven looked up and saw Michael, the Nidoking from before.

"Someone called my name and I jumped back," he replied getting out of the fountain "Then I fell in the fountain and you asked what happened."

Michael looked around the small area that they were in, after a couple seconds he scratched the back of his head.

"Well I didn't call your name, and no one else is here." said the Nidoking "You sleeping and-"

"Sleeping?!" Seven cut Michael off, he looked up and realized that it was morning "This is bad."

"Why?" the poison type asked confused.

"I'm not supposed to go to sleep if I don't have a pendant on." Seven explained, his markings turned gold and he started running his hands through his clothes "I'm not sure what it does exactly but they told me it was important not to sleep without it, was I doing anything in my sleep?"

"Nothing much, maybe you were having a nightmare but that'd be it." Michael said. Seven stopped cold and slowly looked up.

"A nightmare?" he breathed "Oh this is bad, _really_ bad."

Seven walked away from the fountain into the array of buildings with Michael following him. The grass type continued to walk through the buildings until he reached a dead end.

"You're lost, aren't you." Michael said walking up the Seven, the snake sighed and fell to his knees.

"I don't like cities." he moaned. Michael sighed and picked up the grass type. Seven yelped as he was placed on his feet by the larger Pokemon.

"Is their anywhere you need to go?" he asked Seven as they moved out of the alleyway

"The clock tower," Seven answered "I'm supposed meet a friend there, but she didn't say when."

"How old is she?" Michael asked casually maneuvering through the streets.

"Does it matter?" Seven asked, the poison type nodded "Somewhere around my age I think."

The two rounded a corner and Seven stopped when he saw the tower. The green tower stood out from the surrounding white buildings, well in color. Though the tower was tall the buildings surrounding the clock and all the fauna in the square, hiding them

Seven was going to say something to Michael when he saw the poison type staring at him.

"What?" Seven asked. Michael face palmed and pointed to the clock.

"You see what time it is?" he asked as Seven nodded "All the kids here have to work on the weekends from eight to twelve, you're friend's not getting out for another two hours."

Seven mentally cursed the Ninetails as he looked around the town square, he focused his attention on the clock tower and made his way towards it.

Once he got there the tower for any markings, he looked on all four sides, up and down, and even asked a very confused Michael to boost him up.

"Why are we doing this again?" Michael asked sourly as Seven stood on his shoulders.

"I was looking for something," Seven ran his hands over the wooden tower "But it's not here."

Seven released a disappointed breathe and jumped off the Pokémon's shoulders.

"Wait how are you dry?" the Nidoking realized as Seven stood perfectly dry in front of him.

"When Solarbeam isn't charged it just makes heat, so I used it to dry my clothes."

Michael was about to answer when they heard a cry cut through the square. The two turned around to see a young Tailow being chased by three big Pokemon. One of them, a Scrafty, picked up the bird by the leg.

"Looks like it's the runt that owes us money." he sneered. The Tailow shrieked and hid behind her hands. A Tyranitar walked up the to the bird and started pulling on her wings.

"I think we might have to take these as payment." he sneered wickedly.

"No please don't!" the Tailow cried. The last Pokemon, a Graveler, took the Tailow's bag from her side.

"We'll be taking this." the Scrafty said taking the purse "Pay us next week, or else."

Seven looked at Michael whose hands were shaking. Realization hit the Serperior and he was about to cry out for the Nidoking to stop, but Michael was already running. His hand glowed pale blue, an icicle formed in his hand and he aimed for the three Pokemon.

"Michael, he careful!" Seven yelled as he ran towards them "She's a flying type!"

Seven's words went unheard as the icicle shot out of Michael's hand and soared towards its victims. The Icicle Spear hit the Tyranitar square on the chest getting a one hit KO, the spear broke into pieces smashing into the others.

Most of the pieces hit the other two but a big chunk smashed into the Tailow's face knocking her out.

"Who did that!" the Scrafty snarled as he turned towards Michael and Seven. The snake caught up with Michael and took out his Leaf Blade as he sensed the unavoidable battle.

"You take the Graveler." Michael cracked his knuckles "I get the Scrafty."

The four took their battle stances, waiting for the other side to move first. Seven swung his blade and summoned a Leaf Storm, the other three took the hint and charged forward.

A lightning bolt cut through the four stopping all of them. A Manectric in a police uniform walked up to them with an Arcanine and a Machoke behind him.

"What is going on here?" he asked sternly, his gaze shifted to the Scrafty and his group and a smirk formed on his face "Well if it isn't you three, the chief will be happy to see you."

The Scrafty and the Graveler tried to run but were quickly intercepted by the Arcanine, they tried to run back but were knocked out by the Machoke who had snuck up behind them.

The fighting type picked up the three criminals and draped then over his shoulders. The cops were about to leave when they noticed that Michael and Seven hadn't moved from their battle stance. The Arcanine set fire to the leaves causing Seven to cry out in fear.

"Hey Aster," the Machoke said signaling to the Nidoking "Isn't that the idiot from before?"

Aster looked at Michael and a wicked smirk formed upon the electric type's face, he walked over to the poison type and stopped in front of him.

"Hey buddy," the Manectric's voice was riddled with sarcasm "Great job here, just like when you tried out for the force, glad to see that you're still doing a great job fucking up."

Seven could see Michael visibly shaking, he put a hand on the poison type but Michael shook it off roughly.

The three Pokemon laughed and walked away from them, Michael closes his hand into a fist of pure rage. Seven looked at the backs of the three police officers with disgust, he walked over to the young Tailow who had woken up and was clutching her wound in tears.

Seven picked up the reluctant Tailow and cradled her in his arms. He walked over to Michael who was looking at the bird with a guilty face.

"I'm sorry," Michael said through a rough voice "Guess I'm just not cut out to be a good guy." Seven laughed making Michael look up in surprise.

"You a good guy," he said through giggles, Michael hung his head and was about to storm away but was stopped by Seven's next words.

"Why would you think that you aren't?" Seven said continuing to comfort the Tailow.

"You think I'm a good guy?" Michael asked disbelievingly. Seven gave a the Nidoking a glance that asked, _really?_

_"_Even though the first time time I saw you you were an ass I think you've proven me otherwise." Seven passed the young Tailow girl to Michael who almost dropped her in his surprise "You were willing to help me out even though you barely know me and you helped out this girl without a second thought."

"But the cops stopped the other Pokemon." Michael tried to reason.

"Those guys were jerks," Seven retorted "They threw a lightning bolt in the middle of a plaza, knocked out the other Pokemon instead of arresting them properly, left a young wounded girl by herself and made fun of you; If those are the good guys then sign me up for the villain team." Seven smiled crookedly.

He pointed to the girl that Michael was still holding.

"Your heart's in the right place, but your actions are what pretty much kill you." Seven patted Michael on the back "We're got to fix that so here's the plan, first step is for you to take her to the nearest Pokecenter."

"Wait where are you going?" Michael asked. Seven looked across the square to a library that he could was a few streets away.

"I've got to do some stuff don't worry about it." Seven said, Michael nodded slowly and started walking to take the Tailow to the Pokecenter. "Oh and Michael." Seven called out.

Michael stopped and turned back to see the smiling Serperior.

"I bet whoever you were drinking for probably thinks you're a good guy." with that Seven made his way to the library.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven walked into the Alperia Library, the huge building was even more overwhelming on the inside. With three stories of what seemed like never ending rows of books.

"Why do people need such big buildings?" Seven muttered to himself. He walked over to the front desk and to the Leavanny behind it "Excuse me, I was wondering where I could look for, uh, depictions."

"What kind of depictions?" asked the receptionist with a smile.

"Images and stuff like that, a black crown surrounded by colors maybe?"

The librarian put a finger to her chin, she moved over to check the computer on her desk. After a quick search she stood up and signaled for Seven to follow.

They navigated through massive rows of books until the Leavanny stopped at a small section at the back of the building.

"Here's the geology and ancient architecture section," she ran her hand through the books, after a couple rows she stopped and pulled out three books "These talk about images of ancient structures and legends, does it help?"

"A lot," Seven nodded taking the books "Thank you." the Leavanny nodded and walked back to the front of the building. Seven took the books to a nearby table, he opened them and started scanning through the pages.

After about two hours of looking through the overgrown books Seven sighed and closed the third book. The books hadn't revealed anything about dark worlds or black crowns.

He had found what the colored orbs meant though, it was nothing special just a representation of Pokemon types based on color the color. Something interesting that he had found though was that when used in ancient writings it was used to symbolize a specific Pokemon or Pokemon type.

Like with an ancient ritual for rain mentioned in one of the books, the symbols used represented various things, but the blue orbs meant water Pokemon. The book said that the 'blue orbs' had instructions on what to do in the form of the other symbols.

So if all eighteen colors were on the clock tower, that probably meant that they needed all the types for . . . whatever it was the markings wanted.

Which brought him back to the original problem, nothing about the crown. Plus the tower in his nightmare had a lot other markings that he hadn't seen, _a lot_ of other markings.

Seven put the books back in their place and looked at the clock hanging on the nearby wall. It was getting close to twelve o' clock, he should be meeting up with Roxy at the clock tower.

"Well it gives me a chance to check the clock tower again." Seven got up and headed towards the tower.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Roxy made her way to the clock tower, last night she had received the worst lecture from her parents that it made all nine of her tails go between her legs.

She had dragged herself to her room and crawled into bed, then she realized that she hadn't told Seven that she had to work in the morning, or where the clock tower was, or where he was supposed to stay for the night.

Now that she was out of work the Ninetails walked briskly through the busy Alperia streets cutting through people and stalls, if Seven wasn't at the clock tower it could take hours to find him. That was if the people chasing after him hadn't gotten him.

Holding back her bile and the guilt she felt she walked into the heart of the city where the Dialga Tower stood proud among the tall buildings.

Roxy scanned the crowd and easily found her green friend standing close to the clock tower. She jogged over to the grass type who was looking at the tower with a frown.

"What happened?" Roxy asked startling Seven.

"Nothing," he sighed "That's the problem, hi by the way."

Seven had reached the square twenty minutes ago and had begun to investigate the tower again, and in those twenty minutes he confirmed that there were no markings whatsoever.

"What were you looking for?" Roxy asked looking at the clock tower herself.

"Seeing if anything was on the tower." Seven answered truthfully "But if there is, I can't see it."

"Why would there be something on the tower?" Roxy asked looking up "Did you find something last night?"

"Sort of," the snake said "It was more of a hunch than anything."

Roxy offered a brown bag to Seven who took it curiously. He opened it and broke into a large grin when he took out a green pokepuff.

"I don't know if you've eaten or not but I brought you some food, don't know if you like it but-"

Roxy was cut off by Seven taking a huge bite out of the pokepuff, his eyes closed and he let out a content sigh.

"I love mint pokepuffs." he smiled, the two walked over to a cafe and sat down. They sat down and started eating the rest of the pokepuffs.

"So I was thinking that maybe we could go around town so I could show you all my favorite places in Alperia." Roxy smiled, Seven finished his mint puff and smiled.

"You do remember that I'm hiding from criminals, right?" he asked playfully.

"You don't seem to worried about," Roxy answered sincerely "I always figured that someone on the run would act shady and jumpy."

"That was me up until a few days ago." Seven admitted "But then I found out I'm mostly safe during the day."

Roxy raised an eyebrow but didn't press further on, a Volbeat waitress walked up to them carrying a silver tray.

"Two special teas!" she said happily placing the tray on the table, Seven and Roxy looked at the tea confused.

"We didn't order this," Seven said. The Volbeat giggled and pointed at a sign a few feet away from them.

"All grass types and their friends get some of our special tea," she replied with a peppy voice "On the house."

"Thank you." Roxy said shyly, the Volbeat giggled and walked away. Seven picked up the tea and almost dropped it in surprise.

_Peppermint tea_ he thought _of all things. _He smiled at the oh so familiar beverage and kept drinking. Roxy jumped in her chair making Seven jump to.

"I remembered something I wanted to say to you." she said, the Ninetails clamped her hand over her mouth as she realized realized what she said.

"What is it?" Seven asked. Roxy blushed through her fur and looked away.

"I-I'm glad we're friends," she said hurriedly "I don't have any friends, most of the other kids made it a thing to avoid me."

Seven glared unintentionally startling Roxy and making her drop her tea. Seven picked up the glass and put it back on the table.

"If people treat you this way then why do you stay?" Seven asked putting down his tea, he couldn't stand when people bullied others.

"My family." Roxy said "They make things worth it."

Seven smiled bitterly at bittersweet memories he tried not to think of. Instead he thought of what he had to do, he steeled himself and faced Roxy.

"I have to leave." he said quickly, Roxy looked up with a mixture of shock and sadness on her face.

"Right now?" she asked, her tone almost breaking Seven. The snake nodded and bit his bottom lip.

"It'd be better if I started leaving now." he said softly. Roxy looked around as if to find a reason for Seven to stay.

"But can't you stay?" she asked, Seven shook his head "At least for a couple more hours I mean its barely going to be three."

Seven looked at the clock quickly and saw that it was twenty till three.

"I need to give the berries to Null and Void, bye Roxy!" he remembered. He got up and threw a couple pokedollars on the table and started running, Roxy did the same and ran after Seven.

"It's dangerous to go alone!" Roxy yelled taking out items from her pouch "Take this!" she chased after Seven.

**So my friend gave me a shiny Darkrai for my birthday, really awesome gift by the way, and I realized that Darkrai doesn't have legs. **

**Some of you might be saying, duh, but I seriously thought he had legs in-game. Even though it's not really a problem in this story because even Seven who's technically a snake, has arms and legs. But just in case.**

**Darkrai has legs.**

**Random Fact: Shiny Darkrai has green eyes, that's the only thing I don't like about shiny Darkrai, I blame Nintendo.**

**Hope to see you guys later, bye!**

**(No actual offense to Nintendo)**


	4. Chapter 4: Promises

Dusk's Crown Chapter 4: Promises

**Don't really have anything to say, weird.**

**I've been seriously behind I know but I am inspired! (Thank you Virgofox28) I am already working on chapter five and I'm feeling it! **

**Enjoy the chapter! **

Seven and Roxy made it to the top of the cliff where they were supposed to meet Null and Void. The grass type checked his pouch to make sure that the berries were still there, nodding his head in confirmation he closed the pouch and made it to the tree line.

Reaching the end of the forest they quickly realized that the bugs weren't there so they decided to sit down and wait. They were ten minutes late and Seven worried that the two bugs wouldn't even show up.

"Do you think they left?" Roxy asked.

"Don't think they would considering they gave me money." he looked into the woods again and slammed his head against the perky Shedninja herself.

"It took you long enough." said the harsh voice of Null. Seven turned around and was greeted by Null and Void standing behind him, the later whom was somehow hugging Roxy "Stop hugging the Ninetails." Null sighed.

Void made a face that resembled a pout and let Roxy go with a thud. Seven helped the fox up and then took out the berries from his pouch and gave them to Null.

"Was it any trouble?" Void asked jumping in front of Seven.

"Not really," Seven shook his head "I got lost for a bit but other than that, fine."

A breeze blew through the group raising something behind Void. Seven shifted his eyes and noticed that a piece of cloth resembling a cape on Void's back. Null noticed where Seven was staring and quickly pushed the Shedninja away from view.

"Okay you helped us," Null glared "Now get lost." Void gaped at her partner and pushed past her.

"You helped us so here." the Shedninja placed a blue and yellow stone in Seven's hand, it seemed to swirl in the light of the sun.

"Why would you give him that?!* Null hissed, Void giggled at her partner.

"We don't need it." the Shedninja replied perky "And we can't use it, so it made a nice gift and opened up some space in our packs."

Null rolled her eyes and turned back to the stone in Seven's hand. She sighed as she realized that it was pointless to argue with the Shedninja.

"If we ever meet again don't be late." Null said disappearing into the forest. Void giggled and hugged the two Pokemon in front of her.

"Thank you again," she smiled "We're going to Zenia Town and staying there for a while, find us if you ever go!" she waved behind her back.

Seven and Roxy were left at the cliff with mirrored faces of confusion.

"They already left?" Roxy broke the silence. Seven stared at the stone in his hand and put it in his pocket.

"Guess they're the business-y type." Seven shrugged. He looked at Roxy and sighed, before she could ask what was wrong she remembered their conversation in the cafe "I should be going to." Seven said sadly.

"No stay at least for a couple more hours," she begged desperately grabbing Seven's hands, the snake shook his head in response "At least to get, um, supplies!"

"I am low on medical supplies." Seven admitted.

"I'll help you!" the silver fox smiled. Seven found himself smiling and focused his eyes on the edge of the cliff.

An evil smirk formed on his face.

"On two conditions," he said, Roxy nodded showing she was listening "First we have to make this fast."

"We'll be done in less than an hour." she promised, Seven stepped closer to the Ninetails.

"Two, you can't get mad for this." he smiled. Before Roxy ask Seven pushed the fox off the side of the cliff.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven and Roxy walked through the gates of Alperia, the Ninetails limped slightly and the Serperior had a smile painted across his face.

"That's not fun." Roxy moaned painfully, Seven laughed as he followed the kitsune through the streets.

After a couple of minutes they stopped in a fairly empty road lined with houses, Roxy pulled a key from her pocket and put it into the nearest door.

"Wait is this your house?" Seven panicked slightly.

"Uh-huh," she nodded "I need to get some money and I need to tell my parents I'm going out."

Roxy stepped into her house, Seven stayed outside looking at the streets. After a short while he heard the door open and turned around.

"We ready to go-" Seven shut his mouth when an intimidating Ninetails stood at the door.

"Who are you?" the Ninetails asked, unlike Roxy he wasn't a shiny, or shy.

"I'm Seven." the snake said extending his hand.

"What kind if name is that?" asked the fire type making it plainly obvious he wasn't going to even acknowledge Seven's hand.

"The one my parents gave to me." Seven crossed his arms losing all formality.

"My daughter already has a suitor so I recommend you-"

"I'm not interested in your daughter that way," Seven cut the older male off "We're going to do some errands, so is she coming or not because I'm busy."

The Ninetails growled and grabbed Seven by the collar.

"I could fry you right here." he threatened. Seven surprised the fire type by glaring at him intensely causing the Ninetails to let go.

"Then you'd go to jail for abuse of a minor." Seven shot back after the Pokemon dropped him. "If Roxy's not coming out then tell her I'm sorry, but I need to go." Seven turned on his heel and started walking away.

"Seven wait!" Roxy cried out, she pushed past the older Ninetails and chased after him.

"Roxy!" exploded the non shiny Pokémon. Roxy ignored him and fell into step with Seven after finally catching up. After a couple of minutes in silence they walked back into the crowd.

Cutting through a seemingly infinite number of streets Seven recognized Exodus' berry shop sign. Roxy tried opening the door but it was locked, she moved to the window and peered in.

"How is it dark?" she asked "It's actually dark in there."

"He cast a spell in there to change the light." explained Seven, Roxy looked at him surprised "I came here last night, that's why we went with Null and Void a while ago."

"Oh yeah," the Ninetails realized "I was wondering where you'd gotten the berries, so we're not getting berries?"

"Its only open at night time," Seven shook his head "Lets go somewhere else."

After a brief discussion they decided to make their way towards the nearest Pokemart.

"Sorry about my dad." Roxy said looking down after another round of silence "He's not the, listening, type."

"I noticed," Seven responded flatly "And what was that about suitors, aren't you like sixteen?"

"He thinks I should get married instead of learning how to do things." she answered quietly "My mom sends me to school behind his back."

"Really? isn't that a little . . . old fashioned." Seven said "Not to be rude."

"He is," Roxy sighed "He wants me to marry this disgusting Magmortar, he's such a pig and he even asked me to-" she grabbed her muzzle to hold back her disgust.

"Sorry," Seven said sincerely "But didn't you say your family was special to you?"

"They are." she replied quickly "I just don't always agree with my dad, I want to study medicine, and plus there's someone else." the Ninetails blushed, Seven smiled at his friend.

"Really who is it?" Seven asked with a wide smile causing Roxy's blush to deepen.

"He's an Arcanine." she said, Seven remembered the cop from earlier that day and made a face. Roxy caught the look and shook her hands "Not that Arcanine cop, everyone hates him, mine's a different Arcanine."

They made it to the center and through the automatic doors and went to the back. Once they made it to the Pokemart section they bought potions and status alignment medicine and split the bill in half despite Roxy's protests.

They thanked the cashier and walked out of the shop part of the center, it hadn't taken him long to get everything they needed.

"So what's his name-" Seven started to ask.

"You!" a voice thundered through the center cutting Seven off. The two teens turned quickly to see a furious Nidoking making his way to them.

"Do you know him?" asked Roxy.

"Not like this," Seven answered, he put a finger to his chin "Maybe he's drunk?"

"You left me here to deal with that girl!" Michael reached the pair "Her parents came and I had to explain what happened!"

"And everything went fine?" he asked trying to pass a pathetic smile.

"No." Michael growled "After they left _I_ had to use the center."

Seven laughed awkwardly while he rubbed the back of his head, Michael was not amused.

"Who's this?" the poison type focused his attention to the fox next to them. Seven grabbed Roxy by the arm and pulled her closer to Michael.

"This is my friend Roxy!" he said glad to have a distraction "You two should meet." Roxy looked down as Michael stared at her.

"I like shinies," Michael said with a smile making the Ninetails blush "Some are one of the best people I know." the Nidoking blushed through his purple skin.

"T-thanks." Roxy answered embarrassed "I'm Roxy."

"Michael." they shook hands "What are you two doing here?"

"We're buying supplies," Roxy explained "Because Seven is, leaving." her ears fell as she remembered.

Michael blinked and turned towards Seven. "Leaving?" he asked simply, Roxy nodded. The Nidoking pushed the Ninetails softly out of the way and stepped closer to Seven "Leaving?" he repeated to Seven.

"Some things came up and I have to-" Seven tried to explain.

"You promised you'd help me." Michael interrupted, his gaze turning hard "You said that you'd help make me a better person."

Seven hung his head "You said _we're going to fix that_, did you forget?" Michael accused "Or were you lying, or does a promise mean nothing to you?"

"It's not that easy!" Seven suddenly yelled angry.

"Oh what you have some big important mission that requires your attention!" Michael mocked.

"Hey guys calm down." Roxy tried to step in-between them.

"You think I want to leave!" Seven's raised his voice

"Sure looks like it!" Michael accused. Seven suddenly pushed past Michael and ran out of the center with tears in his eyes.

"Seven wait!" Roxy cried out.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven walked slowly through Alperia hopelessly lost. Hours had passed and he couldn't even find the gates to the city.

He hugged himself as he slowly tried to find anything familiar, he rubbed his eyes that were still red and puffy.

Seven looked up at the sun who was about to go in for the night.

"I can't be in the dark," Seven voiced his thoughts "I should've been gone hours ago." He let go of his arms and picked up the pace.

"Seven!" Roxy suddenly called out from behind him. Seven turned around quickly to see the shiny Ninetails jogging towards him "We've been looking for you!"

"We?" Seven asked softly, almost . Michael appeared around the corner and made his way towards the two younger Pokemon "You two were looking for me?" he asked disbelievingly.

"Of course." Roxy said, Michael nodded not looking at Seven "You're our friend."

Seven wiped a rouge tear and smiled "I guess it's been a while since I've called people friends." his face fell as he looked at the sun "But it doesn't matter, I should've been gone hours ago."

"Why?" Roxy asked worried.

"Remember the people chasing me?" Seven asked, the fox nodded.

"There's people chasing you?" Michael asked, Seven nodded and turned towards the sun again.

"They know where I am when it gets dark," the grass type hung his head

"But you were in the city at night yesterday." Roxy thought out loud

"I thought I had some distance on them, that's why I wanted to leave," Seven explained "To get cover some ground before they found me."

"Do they find you because it's dark or because it's night." Michael asked stepping forward.

"They can find me anytime I'm in shadows, but it's a lot stronger at night." Seven explained. The Nidoking grabbed the snake by the arm and pulled him through the streets.

"What are you doing?!" Seven cried out. Roxy ran up next to him and smiled.

"We have a plan." she said smiling. They dragged the snake quickly as the sun seemed to set at an alarming rate.

At this point they were all in a full fledged run. "Can you tell me where we're going now?!" Seven asked through their mini marathon.

"Over there!" Michael pointed ahead. Seven turned and saw Exodus' shop, it clicked together.

"Seven hurry!" Roxy cried out. The sun was practically gone and the veil of shadows was falling on the city towards them. Seven gritted his teeth and ran at full speed, he opened the door as the veil of darkness fell upon the shop.

Light blasted his vision as Seven stepped in, he slammed the door behind him and fell to the ground.

He had no idea if he made it or not.

**Oh your done? That was fast.**

**This chapter was going to be longer but I thought I was putting to much and felt like it was dragging and that's not a good thing so I cut a lot from this chapter.**

**But hey on the plus side I got some of the next chapter done!**

**I realized I didn't give credit for the OC's in this story so now's as good as time as any!**

**Null and Void: Twilight Joltik. (Has a back story on them if you want to check that out)**

**Roxy the shiny Ninetails: Flickering Fire.**

**Michael a.k.a Michael: Virgofox28.**

**Thanks to all of you for your OC's and all of **_**you**_** for reading.**

**See you next time! I'll bring cake!**


	5. Chapter 5: He's Here

Dusk's Crown Chapter 5: He's Here

**I'm back! The cake got squashed by Seto, wait I'm getting ahead of myself, ha.**

**Kind of short chapter but eh, quality over quantity. Don't worry the next chapter will be up very soon *wink***

**Well I'll leave you to it, have fun!**

Exodus had freaked out when Seven had barged in and had started ranting, sadly for the Serperior neither Roxy or Michael walked in.

"I'm so sorry." Seven said for probably the hundredth time. The normally happy Gengar now had a serious expression.

"What are you doing here again?" the ghost asked. Seven sighed, since Roxy and Michael were the ones that had made up the plan he had no idea what he was supposed to do.

But then again he had a pretty good idea.

"Can I stay here?" he asked wincing at how awkward it sounded.

The question took Exodus by surprise. "Why would you want to stay here?" he asked rubbing the back of his neck.

"It's a long story," Seven sighed "But the shortest way to explain is that I can't be in the dark."

"I don't really have any place that you can stay," Exodus said with an apologetic voice "I don't think I could-"

"Please!" Seven said out of nowhere "It can just be for tonight I swear, please don't kick me out!" Seven was now shaking, it was all he could do to not start crying in front of the ghost.

"Is it really that serious?" Exodus asked, all signs of embarrassment left him as he placed a hand on Seven's shoulder.

Seven nodded wiping away a stray tear. Exodus gave him a small smile and pushed him gently to the front of the store.

"Sit here." he told Seven, the snake sat down at the counter obediently "I need to go out real quick, are you going to be okay?"

Seven nodded, Exodus walked to the door reluctantly, "If anyone walks in, there's a binder in there that has all the prices." he grabbed the handle and turned back towards Seven one more time before he left.

Half an hour and three customers later the shop was empty again, three times he almost had a heart attack and three times he released the biggest sighs of relief in his life.

He had smiled broadly at the customers because he was happy that they weren't trying to capture and/or kill him. He was surprised that this many Pokemon came to the store so late, or any Pokemon for that matter.

It's nice doing something like this for a change, he thought. His eyes wandered around the store and eventually settled on a mirror that was stationed on the counter.

He studied his reflection, for someone who was on the run he didn't look so bad.

Seven smiled and continue to stare at his reflection. After a couple minutes of analyzing himself he looked away but stopped when a flash of blue caught his eye.

For the briefest of seconds his eyes had turned bright blue before turning back to his crimson red eyes. Seven covered his mouth to stop himself from hyperventilating, he looked around the shop in a wild frenzy.

The shop's windows blackened immensely and the air in the shop ran still. Seven stood frozen in fear he couldn't even find the courage to hide. The store slowly turned grey and blue, the air turned cold as frosty wind escaped through Seven's fingertips and he started to shake violently.

Shadows began to slide from underneath the door, the dark coils slowly dragged themselves across the wooden floor of the store towards Seven.

A tentacle reached Seven and he shuddered as it began wrapping itself around his leg. At this point Seven tried to run but the tendril tightened against him and made him fall.

Seven grabbed onto the table as more and more of the black gunk reached out to grab him, "Ngh!" he struggled more and more against them as they seemed to take their time restraining him.

They already had his lower body ensnared and were slowly but surely holding down his arms, he tried to scream but a coil wrapped around mouth and snapped his head against the floor. Seven cried out in pain and tried one more time to struggle, but the tendrils were locked to the floor and were not giving in an inch.

The door suddenly flew off its hinges and into the the black abyss that had formed outside. The darkness swirled into the shop and gradually began forming into the Pokemon that literally haunted Seven's dreams.

The shadows finally came together and Darkrai, the nightmare Pokemon, stood in front of Seven. The grass type doubled his efforts as the dark Pokemon slowly walked over.

He reached Seven and gently grabbed the snake by the face. Seven tried to cry out but Darkrai covered his mouth.

The dark type shook his head and slapped Seven across the face.

Seven let out a scream and jumped up, his head banged against something making him fall back down.

"I've been trying to wake you up for almost ten minutes!" Exodus grabbed his face. "And then you slam into me?!"

Seven ignored the ghost and looked around in a blazing panic. The air wasn't chilly anymore and the light was back, though it was a bit darker.

He checked his wrists for any signs that he'd been held down and found nothing. Seven looked through to window and saw the sun coming up.

Then he grabbed the mirror on the counter and checked his eyes, they were red again.

He sighed and shakily stood up."I'm safe," he said to himself "For a couple days at most."

"From what?" Exodus asked, clearly confused.

"Darkrai." he answered putting the mirror down "He's been chasing me for months."

**Yup, finally wrote the man himself in. Wait what the heck happened you ask? You'll find out *smiles***

**Until next time! *Bows***


	6. Chapter 6: The day After

Dusk's Crown Chapter 6:

**Bet you weren't expecting this so soon! Yup, it's a nice little surprise.**

**I have cake this time, but I can't, give, it, to, you. . . Okay so let's get to it!**

Seven exited the store before it got dark and, ironically, stepped into the daylight.

He closed the door softly and slumped down against it. It had taken all had not to breakdown in front of Exodus when he had to give him an explanation.

But now that he was alone his tears wouldn't stop falling and a few seconds later and he was full scale crying.

He was tired of the running, he was tired of not knowing why any of these things were happening, he was tired of being alone, of not knowing where he was going to sleep or eat that day, he missed Blaze, his brothers and his sisters, his mom, but most of all.

"I miss you." Seven sobbed "I need you." he cried more intensely "I want you here!"

He cried for a couple more minutes and almost missed the quiet pair of footsteps. He looked up and there was Roxy and Michael offering him their hands.

"You shouldn't see me like this." Seven wiped his tears away. They said nothing as they kept their hands there. Seven wiped away the last of his tears and grabbed both of their hands.

They pulled him up and Roxy dragged him into a hug. "We're your friends, we're here for you."

"Yeah." Michael slapped Seven's back "That's what we're here for."

The snake smiled at both of them and wiped away a stray tear. "Thanks, there's something I need to tell you guys." he said serious.

He released himself from Roxy and looked both of them in the eye. "I think it's better if we sit down for this, let's go somewhere else."

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

"What do you know about nightmares?" Seven asked picking up his tea.

They were at the café from yesterday, which they learned was named Paradis, and luckily for them it was poison type day.

"Well they say it's just your subconscious showing you stress from everyday life." Roxy answered unsure of where the conversation was going.

"Anything else?" Seven asked strangely stoic.

"Darkrai," Michael snapped sourly "They say he's the reason Pokemon have nightmares in the first place."

"Do you believe in him?" Seven asked both of them.

"I've met a Keldeo, Coballion and Terrakion." Michael deadpanned "I don't think it's that far fetched."

Seven gave a small laugh despite himself "I know Darkrai," he continued "Personally, I mean, we met a long time ago and we've actually been through a lot."

"He's helped me when I was weak and I did the same for him, he's honestly been there for me since I can remember."

Roxy and Michael looked at each other but didn't say anything.

"Then a couple months ago me and my friend were traveling with him when," Seven closed his eyes and put his paw to his mouth "I don't want to get into details but he's, different."

"What did he do?" Roxy asked quietly. Seven shook his head again and refused to look at them, the Ninetails smiled softly and placed her hand on his shoulder.

"Was it really that bad?" Michael asked.

"I haven't seen my friend since that last time." Seven muttered sadly as his ears fell "I hope he's okay."

"So your plan to run for the rest of your life," Michael pushed his tea to the snake "Doesn't sound like the best plan."

Seven sighed and put his head between his hands "I know," he admitted "But I have an idea."

"What is it?" Roxy asked

"I've had two dreams, one that I've kind of looked into and another one I had today. I think I kind of know what what to look for now." Seven started.

"Are you sure you really know?" the Nidoking "And even if you do Darkrai sounds like he might hurt you, do you really want to-"

"I'm sure." Seven said adamantly "I'm going to do this, I'm bringing him back."

Michael bit his lip but nodded, Roxy squeezed his shoulder and nodded to. "What's your plan then?" he asked

"Well let me explain what I've been dreaming about first." Seven started to tell them both about his nightmares.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven made his way through the morning streets that were still struggling to get up.

Now that he had a little experience in the city he could find his way more easily; right now he was heading for the library again, he wanted to check the folklore section this time.

Roxy and Michael had tried to convince him to not going alone, but the Ninetails had to go home and Michael had something to do but wouldn't say what.

Since there were no other options they reluctantly let him go. Now he was only slightly lost, so there was some improvement.

He turned a corner to meet a dark alleyway, the library wasn't that far off but he'd have cut through the alleyway.

_To dark_ Seven thought shaking his head _plus who's dumb enough to walk through an alleyway in a city?_

Shaking his head again he turned back but slammed into someone causing both of them to fall down.

"Ah my head!" the other Pokemon said, Seven opened his eyes and saw a really big Eevee "I'm sorry." the normal type said through his teeth.

"No it's my fault." Seven said getting up and offering a hand, the Eevee took his hand and pulled himself up. Seven stopped himself from gasping when he stood up, the Eevee was a gaping six foot tall piece of fur.

"Sorry again." the normal type said grabbing his head "I'm Seto."

"I'm Seven," the snake looked over his shoulder, he really didn't like those shadows "It was nice meeting you but I have to go."

Seven moved passed him but Seto grabbed his shoulder. He turned back and saw the other having an intense internal struggle.

"There's a little shop close to the clock tower, it's more of a a guru place but," Seven raised an eyebrow "Sorry I'll get to the point. They know a lot about myths and folklore and they might be able to help you."

Seven moved Seto's hand away and took a step back. "How do you know about that?' he glared

The Eevee stammered but couldn't find a response. "I-I gotta go!" he pushed Seven out of the way and ran into the alleyway.

"Hey wait!" Seven called out, he jogged forward but stopped a foot away from the dark. Angry he charged his Solarbeam and shot it into the alleyway. "I hope that hit you!" he huffed in annoyance and stalked off.

A little later he made it to the clock tower square and took a quick scan of the plaza, his eyes stopped at a shop that said _Pokelore_.

Should I? he thought nervously. He went to the shop and grabbed the door handle "I might regret this." Taking a deep breathe he opened the door and stepped in.

Instantly he was hit with the smell of herbs and pale light. Pokelore was decorated like a gypsy parlor, complete with lace like curtains, cabinets filled with weird items and everything.

"Cool," Seven breathed.

"What you want?!" asked a woman behind Seven. The snake jumped to see an annoyed Gothitelle "You came to see Miss Cleo or be stupid?"

"Excuse me?" Seven asked, her accent was a very thick middle eastern accent and Seven was having a hard time understanding her.

"You stupid," the Gothitelle grabbed her face "Did you come to see Miss Cleo?!" she exclaimed.

"Who's Miss Cleo?" Seven asked nervously.

"You are talking to Miss Cleo." she said angrily "Miss Cleo should grab ear and throw you out!" the Gothitelle threatened.

Seven backed away and bumped into a table knocking over various objects.

"Cleo you're scaring him." yawned a Musharna "What did I tell you about greeting customers?"

"It Miss Cleo for you." replied Miss Cleo, the Musharna raised an eyebrow. Miss Cleo flinched slightly and looked away "If greet customers then Miss Cleo don't be rude."

"Exactly." the pink Pokemon smiled putting a crystal ball back on the shelf "I'm Florica, we specialize in folklore and dreams; what can we do?"

"Wait dreams?" Seven asked, Florica nodded "Do you think you can check mine?"

The Musharna grabbed Seven by the hand and led him past the purple curtains, there was a lone chair sitting in the middle of the room surrounded by an array of plants and other trinkets.

Florica motioned for him to sit down, he walked over to the seat and followed instructions. The two psychic types started grabbing various objects from around the room and began a flurry of plucking, grabbing and mixing.

Florica then grabbed a large slender cigarette and lit it. She took a long puff and blew out a bright pink smoke.

"Miss Cleo wish you no smoke." the Gothitelle sighed. Florica smiled and walked over to Seven.

"What kind of dream are we looking for?" she asked sweetly "Is it a lost one or do you want to remember a specific detail."

"Or you want wet dream again?" Miss Cleo snickered, Florica responded by throwing a vase at her.

"It's a nightmare," Seven answered, this was sadly not the weirdest conversation he'd been in "And I want to see an image from one of them."

Florica nodded taking another puff of her cigarette "We just have to warn you, once I get the dream you won't remember it at all: are you okay with that?"

Seven nodded, his memory of the tower was getting hazy anyways.

"What are we looking for?" Miss Cleo asked. Seven told them about the clock tower and the pictures on it. Both of them nodded and continued preparing "We're going to put you to sleep now."

"Hold on." Seven said, he reached into his pocket and put on a necklace with a bright feather attached to it.

Seven closed his eyes and took a deep breath, he nodded to signal that he was ready. He felt two hands on him then he felt a sudden wetness on his head.

Seven opened his eyes to see Florica nomming his head "What the heck are you-!" he said right before he fell unconscious.

_Why isn't anything happening?_ Seven asked as black filled his vision _Guess I'm to tired to dream right now._

After what seemed like minutes A loud bang woke him up, he bolted up and saw Florica coughing out black gunk.

"Take deep breath." Miss Cleo was telling her partner. The Musharna coughed more of black gunk and wiped her mouth.

"What happened?!" Seven got up.

"You have really dark and horrible dreams," Florica trembled. She picked up her cigarette and took a shaky puff, her smoke was now black and wispy.

Miss Cleo took the cigarette and waved it into a circle. The ring of smoke expanded and became a mid air picture of the clock tower.

"This is ritual," Miss Cleo explained, Seven opened his mouth but the Gothitelle raised her hand "For what? Miss Cleo no know."

"But we can find out." Florica got up, she pointed to one of the glowing orbs in the picture "In most rituals this light isn't surrounding the Pokemon, I think it might mean something."

"Of course it mean something," Miss Cleo snapped "Everything means something."

Florica sighed and motioned for Seven to get up and go to the front door. "I've seen that sign before but you'll have to give me some time, we'll tell you when we've found something." the Musharna said pushing Seven out.

"Wait but don't I have to pay?!" Seven asked as he was forced outside.

"We'd be horrible people if we made you pay for something like that," Florica pushed Seven out "And don't worry about how we'll find you, we're physics." she slammed the door and the sign at the fromt changed to _sorry we're closed_.

"Why do people keep pushing me?" he asked grabbing his head. Everyone was shoving him this way and that recently. "I can walk by myself." he muttered.

"Kid!" Exodus called out from behind him. Seven turned to see the ghost making his way to him, he started walking to meet up with him.

"I've been looking for you." Exodus gave Seven a pale blue lunchbox. He opened the box and saw a neat little lunch packed inside "I figured that since you had to sleep in a berry shop, you probably didn't have much to eat either; so I, made you some lunch."

"Wow, I don't know what to say." Seven was at a loss for words. Exodus sighed in relief and flashed a big smile.

"I'm glad!" the ghost said happily "Are you going to stay in the shop again tonight?"

"Probably, if that's okay with you." Seven held the lunchbox to his chest, Exodus smiled even wider and nodded.

"I'll be glad to have you, well you probably have stuff to do." he said "I'll see you tonight." with that he waved goodbye and melted into the streets.

Seven waved to the ghost and turned his attention back to the little lunchbox "Well no point in getting lost again, let's eat!" he said happily making his way to the café.

**I ended on a happy note for a change, to much drama can get overwhelming if not the mood isn't lightened from time to time**

**Any thoughts, comments, concerns that you guys can have. I'll be more than glad to answer.**

**Until next time *bows* au revoir!**


	7. Chapter 7: Hidden Feelings

Dusk's Crown Chapter 7: Hidden Feelings

**Quick announcement! I redesigned Seven, he now has a big tail and his cloak er-thing doesn't reach his feet. I mention this because I will be using the tail in the story and it was never mentioned before so, yeah.**

**Sorry for not updating sooner but this week has been crazy. I've had four projects and a side job, I'm ready to drop dead. Plus writer's block, intense writer's block, but I'm overcoming it!**

**But enough about that, here's the chapter!**

"What do you mean he left?!" Michael, grabbing the attention of the people next to him.

"I mean exactly what I mean." said the Arcanine on the screen.

"Where'd he go?!" Michael couldn't believe that Aladar had actually decided to leave Ray Town.

"A lot of things happened to him here; with the Swords, Kicks, and a few other things." the canine explained "He left a couple days ago with team Magma; he's probably just passed Alperia."

"Alperia." Michael blinked rather dumbfounded.

"Yeah, why, where are you?" Michael remained quiet and that was more than enough for the fire type "Well that's unfortunate."

"You think?" Michael asked sarcastically.

"I have to go." the Arcanine looked to his left "Sorry about all that."

"No problem," Michael gave a small smile "Thanks Ratchet." Ratchet nodded and ended the videocall.

_'Maybe it's for the best,'_ he thought '_I don't think I'm ready to face Aladar just yet.'_

"Hey." Roxy suddenly appeared and broke his train of thoughts "What'cha doing?"

"Just ended a video call." he explained, Roxy nodded and sat down next to him.

"I saw that," she said "that was a cute Arcanine by the way, but I meant what're you thinking about."

Michael looked at the blank screen "Just thinking about someone special."

"He must be someone really special if he's got you like this." she smiled at Michael's surprised reaction.

"How'd you know it was a guy?" he asked.

Roxy giggled and pointed to a Mienshao that was nearby "My teacher teaches me more than just medicine."

"You were listening to my conversation?" he asked, Roxy blushed in embarrassment and this Michael chuckled at her reaction "Could he teach me some time?"

Roxy laughed and got up "I'm gonna leave, wanna come?" Michael nodded. After she said goodbye to the Mienshao they silently walked out of the center and into the busy streets.

After a couple of minutes of wandering around and talking they suddenly stopped and looked around in confusion.

"Why did you bring us here?" Roxy asked.

"I was following you." Michael said in surprise, he snickered and started chuckling "Aren't you the one that lives here?"

Roxy blushed and looked down "Yeah sorry, guess I got distracted."

"Look, it's the slut with a new client!" a teenage Gudurr called out, a group of teenagers started laughing and making fun of Roxy.

Roxy's expression changed completely, her tails fell as she silently walked away.

"Where you going slut!" another called out. Michael watched as Roxy distanced herself from them, he turned and gave the group a nasty look, shutting most of them up. He shook his head and went towards the Ninetails.

"What was that?!" he exclaimed after reaching her. Roxy shrugged her shoulders and kept walking.

Michael sighed "Why do you let them do that to you?"

"That's what they've always done." she said matter-of-factly. Michael's brow scrunched as Roxy refused to look at him.

"Is it because you're a shiny?" he asked, Roxy hesitated but nodded. "That's a stupid reason, I should know. All that bullying leads to bad things."

"I'm going home." Roxy ignored him, she stepped past Michael and swiftly walked away.

Michael shook his head, following her wouldn't help anything.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven closed his lunch box and smiled to himself, having a home cooked meal again felt nice. He stretched his arms and lazily started looking at the people. If Alperia had something it was diversity.

There were Pokémon from all types like Vileplumes, Avaluggs, Beedrills; a Mightyena, Mismagius and a Scizor.

_Wait, what?_ Seven stopped his train of thought, he quickly hid under the table and silently hoped that they hadn't seen him.

Seven peeked through a crack in the mantle and saw that they were heading towards him.

They picked the table he was hiding under and sat down. Seven sat still as each pair of legs were only inches away from touching him.

"My head still hurts." Ren muttered softly.

"Don't be ridiculous." Nix snapped "He didn't even hit you that hard."

Ren scoffed and roughly put his shoulders on the table, the force caused the table to bounce and hit Seven.

A small yelp escaped him causing the Illumise waitress to notice him, Seven put his finger to his lip and the bug type nodded.

"Hello!" she said walking up to the three "I'm Mary and I'll be your waitress today!"

The trio grunted in response which earned a pout from her. Kaven noticed her face and grimaced.

"Fine, we'll take some sodas." Kaven waved her off. Mary nodded and went back inside leaving them in a tired silence.

"Don't you think it's weird that those guys never came?" Ren questioned.

"At the very least we should've been taken in for failing our mission." Nix agreed "They probably ran into some trouble."

"How sad." Ren muttered sarcastically. Kaven tried to kick him but kicked Seven instead "You're getting weak there buggy." Ren smirked.

Kaven huffed but thankfully didn't try to kick Ren again, Mary came with the sodas and gave Seven a sideways glance.

Once she left the three started going into aimless chatter, this went on for a while and Seven remained as motionless as possible.

"Do you think those drugs they gave us were defective or something," Ren asked grabbing Seven's attention "They wore off pretty quickly"

"It was black and watery, it was probably outdated or something." Kaven dismissed, Seven cringed as he remembered when the needle had plunged into his neck.

Ren suddenly reached under the table and grabbed one of Seven's ears. Seven stared dumbfounded as the dark typed started rubbing his ear and slowly moved up until he reached Nix's leg.

"What're you doing?!" Nix asked panicked, Ren rocketed his hand back and locked his arms together.

"N-nothing!" he stammered. Kaven sighed audibly and called Mary for the check. After an awkward silence they paid the check and left.

Once they were gone Mary went to the table and tapped on it "You can come out now." she said, Seven crawled out from under the table and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Thanks." Seven said, Mary put down her notepad and moved his hand. He was surprised but didn't stop as Mary checked the wound on the back of his neck, it still hadn't healed completely and was still pink.

"What happened?!" she asked roughly moving his cowl aside.

"They drugged me a couple days ago," he admitted. Mary's jaw dropped and she pulled out a holo-caster "No no no, it was probably just sedatives!" Seven grabbed the holo-caster.

"They still drugged you!" she exclaimed "We have to do something."

"I can't get the police involved." Seven said, Mary's expression told him he needed to explain "I may have to leave at a moment's notice, I can't get stuck in something that'll take hours, even days."

Mary put her hands on his shoulders and looked him in the face "They. Drugged. You!"

Seven gave her a pleading look "If you really want to help me then promise me you won't say anything."

"I can't do that." she said quickly, Seven gave her another pleading gaze, she sighed and grabbed her head "Why would you have to leave, are you doing something illegal because I swear if-"

"I'm not," he cut her off "It's, complicated, to say the least."

"Complicated enough you won't call the police for kidnapping?" she asked sarcastically. Seven hung his head in response, after a brief moment of silence she exhaled and muttered "I'm gonna hate myself later."

Seven's head shot up and he flashed a wide smile. Mary held up her hand "But you have to come here at least once a day so I know you're alright, and if I see them again I'm calling the police immediately."

Seven nodded, the Volbeat picked up her notepad and walked away muttering to herself.

Seven visibly deflated as he let out a huge sigh and slumped into a chair.

"That sucked." he muttered.

"Is that what you were doing under there?" Michael walked up to him with a smirk.

"What, no!" Seven turned bright red. Michael laughed and patted him on the back, Seven sighed and reached for his lunchbox "Hey where'd it go?!" he got up.

"What?" Michael asked as Seven frantically looked around the café.

"My lunchbox," he grabbed his head "Exodus gave it to me and now it's gone, they probably took it."

"Was it important?" Michael asked, Seven opened his mouth then closed it.

"I guess not." he said quietly "I just, I feel bad for losing it." Seven grimaced and stared at the barren table

**Thanks to Virgofox28 for lending me his character Ratchet for a brief cameo. it's not what you think, there's a logical explanation.**

**Also! I'm going to write more chapters in advance so the next update might take a while but the ones after that should be posted a lot quicker. I'm also going to fix the previous chapters, they're bad *shudders*.**

**Well bye now!**


	8. Chapter 8: End of a Long Day

Dusk's Crown Chapter 8: End of a Long Day

**I could give an excuse for the delay but do you really want to hear it?**

**That's what I thought.**

**Enjoy!**

"So how's your day been?" Michael asked leaning back in his seat.

"It's been a long day." Seven admitted sitting down too. "How'd your day go?"

Michael shrugged while looking through the crowd "Did you see a green Zangoose pass by today?" he asked. Seven thought about it and shook his head.

"Is that even possible?" the snake asked. Michael smiled softly and nodded, he took out a picture of a green Zangoose that looked pretty good. "Wow, he probably gets hit on a lot."

"You have no idea," Michael started laughing "The next time there's a war it'll be all the guys who want to date him fighting against each other."

"Sounds like those guys should keep their dicks in their pants." Seven smirked. Michael laughed harder which caused the grass type to smile.

"Hey, are you still staying at the berry shop?" Michael asked once he calmed down a little, Seven nodded but wasn't looking at him "What exactly did you tell him?"

"Not enough." Seven admitted hanging his head "I told him I was being followed and that I couldn't be out at night, so I basically gave him the broadest of explanations." Michael opened his mouth but the clock tower struck seven o'clock. Seven got up and got all his things in a hurry.

"I should go before it starts getting too dark, see you later Michael." Seven waved and hurriedly walked away. Michael opened his mouth to call out but closed it instead, he sighed and left the café shaking his head.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven was sitting at the counter in Exodus' shop again, he decided that he might as well help as long as he stayed here. Even though Seven felt highly uneasy being at the counter again but he didn't know how to do anything else in the shop.

The door opened pulling him out of his thoughts and an Empoleon walked in covering his eyes at the sudden light. Seven mentally sighed in relief and then chuckled at the older man's expression.

"Welcome to Exodus' Berry shop!" Seven cheerfully repeated what the ghost had told him to say "Where every berry is berry good." Seven wondered why Exodus chose that slogan

"Pleased to meet you," the penguin shielded his eyes "I am Malcaray, are you Exodus?"

"No, I just help out." Seven got up from behind the counter "What can I help you with?"

"I need two Payapa berries for a remedy." Malcary took out a picture of a hot pink berry. Seven looked at the picture and went into the rows of stalls. A few minutes later he came back with two ripe and juicy berries.

"I picked out some of the ripest ones" he placed the berries down and picked up the price list "That'll be thirty pokedollars"

"May I ask a question?" the penguin asked. Seven tensed up but nodded. "Why is someone as young as yourself working so late at night?"

"That's kind of a touchy subject." Seven rubbed the back of his head in discomfort, Malcary took out a paper and wrote down an address.

"Come here if you ever need to, talk." the Empoleon darted his eyes to the back "If you're ever in need of assistance." he exited to shop leaving Seven confused. Exodus opened the back door and came in carrying a box of berries.

"Did we get a customer or did someone think we were a bar again?" he asked through a smile.

"I, uh, no. No drunk people." Seven answered still mildly confused.

"That's a new record." Exodus laughed "You're doing wonders to my store already." Seven's grin grew into a full smile which morphed into a loud yawn; Seven closed his eyes and laid his head against the counter.

"You should get some sleep," Exodus pulled Seven up once he finished putting the berries away "I set up a bed for you in the back."

Seven nodded distractedly as he let Exodus lead him. Exodus opened a blue door and revealed a small blue room with a small bed and desk.

"I'll wake you up before the store gets dark." Exodus walked back to the store leaving Seven in the new room. Seven sluggishly looked around the room. It was barely big enough for him to walk around, and that's because he was short for a Serperior.

Seven put his small pack on the desk and slid out of his clothes except his underwear, he moved over to the bed and went under the covers. His head hit the pillow but he opened his eyes when he noticed his feet went over the edge of the bed.

_'Heh, well now it feels a little more like my old bed.'_ Seven closed his eyes and let sleep take him.

When he opened his eyes he was standing on a dirt road surrounded by small _houses 'This is a dream isn't it?'_ Seven sighed mentally _'But this isn't my hometown, this is where-"_

"What're you doing standing there in the middle of the road for?!" a Slyveon came out of one of the nearby houses "You got yourself a Romeo, you don't want to keep him waiting." The Slyveon walked up to Seven and cheerfully reached for his arm. Seven expected the all too familiar pull but was surprised to see another Seven come out of him.

"Hey! Shouldn't you be focusing on getting your own Romeo instead of worrying about mine Blaze?" the other Seven smiled wittily. Blaze put his hands to his heart and faked an indignant gasp. The dream Seven lightly pushed him and they both broke into laughter.

_'Hard to think this was just two months ago.'_ Seven smiled fondly. He watched Blaze and himself continue waking and started following them once they were starting to walk out of his line of sight.

"So how'd you get him to come here?" Blaze asked, Seven caught up to his dream self and they both broke into a smile "Wait, don't tell me he asked you!" Blaze exclaimed surprised.

Seven's dream self blushed intensely as Blaze's smile grew from ear to ear. "He's been talking a lot more, it's nice."

"We got to make sure this goes great!" Blaze exclaimed "I won't be there to freak him out so you're going to have a real conversation, if you two can manage to get a word out. Remember to smile more, think you can handle that?" Blaze winked.

At that point Seven stopped walking and let the duo walk away._ 'Smile more, I can do that. For you, both of you."_

**Smiling during a tough situation is a very hard thing to do, not just in fiction but in real life. Whether you agree or disagree I think it takes a strong person to keep smiling while things are going wrong.**

**I have something to ask you guys. The very first moment in chapter one is when Seven and Darkrai interact and many might assume that it is a flashback, my question to you is; are you sure? This story seems to be focusing on dreams so maybe it was just that, a dream. Or I'm trying to get into your heads, I'll leave you people to think on that, bye!**

**Also that thing with the green Zangoose causing a war, I firmly believe that. Go read Tales of a Green Zangoose, you'll see.**


	9. Chapter 9: An Appointment

Dusk's Crown Chapter 9: An Appointment

***Stops playing Jubyphonic* ha-ha sorry about that. Here's another chapter to DC, changes (big and small) might be made the previous chapters, if they are worth mention I will say so. I can think of two off the top of my head that may come up, but now's not the time for that.**

**Let's get readin'!**

Seven walked up to Paradis café to let Mary know that he was okay like he had promised yesterday, the sun was still low in the sky so the café wasn't open and the tables weren't even set up yet. "Maybe I came a little too early." Seven looked at the open hours sign, he'd have to wait another twenty minutes before the café opened.

"Hello green one." Miss Cleo said next to Seven. Seven jumped back and summoned a Leaf Blade towards the psychic, she looked at the sword then back at him with a monotone expression "Is this joke?" she asked unamused.

"Sorry." Seven made the sword go away "I'm not too crazy about people sneaking up on me."

"Miss Cleo not care." she reached into a pocket in her dress and pulled at a small sliver of paper, she grabbed Seven's hand and gave him the paper "You go to address today, friend is there for you."

"I'm not going to a random stranger's house." Seven passed the paper back. Miss Cleo pushed Seven's hand back again and shook her head.

"He good man, he help Miss Cleo and Florica help you." Seven bit his lip, he didn't want to go to someone who was potentially dangerous, but he didn't want to turn down one of the few people that could maybe explain what was happening.

"I'll think about." Seven put the paper away in his pack "Can I ask how you found me anyways?"

"Your necklace give very powerful signal, be careful with it." Miss Cleo looked away from Seven but spoke again "You no have to go, Miss Cleo only send you because he do what Miss Cleo and Florica cannot . . . but if you repeat what Miss Cleo said Miss Cleo swat you on the head." she threatened.

Seven held his pack and pulled it closer to him, last night he had fallen asleep with the Lunar Wing that his mom had given him, looks like it wasn't a fake after all. He looked for Miss Cleo and held back a laugh as he watched the Gothitelle walking away and looking flustered. Maybe she didn't like admitting that there were some things she couldn't do.

The café wasn't going to be open for a little more so Seven sat on the table again, not too long after Mary walked up to the café and smiled when she noticed him. "Well aren't you a man of your word." the Illumise smiled as she opened the café. She pushed the door open and offered Seven to come in.

"I don't like breaking promises." Seven explained as he looked around the inside of the café, this was actually the first time he had stepped indoors. It looked natural, having wooden floors and walls with flowers and vines growing all around the building. It looked almost nothing like it's plain outside counterpart.

But the place was also wrecked beyond beleif.

"Did someone break in?!" Seven asked in shock. Mary gave a small chuckle but shook her head.

"Let's just say this place has a different crowd at night, luckily I don't work the night shift." the bug type began picking up random trash from off the ground. Seven put his pack on a clean spot on the barista counter and started helping Mary clean the shop. After more half an hour of fixing the shop the placed looked almost spotless.

"Thanks for the help, I'll be right back I need to change into my uniform." Mary said as she quickly ran into the back room. Seven stretched and turned his head toward the door, he noticed a tall Rampardos approaching the entrance. The Rampardos opened the door but his head bounced against the top of the door frame.

"I thought this door was bigger." the Rampardos muttered as he rubbed his head. He ducked under the door and entered the café, the rock type easily passed six feet and was extremely muscled "Hi, I'm here to pick up a cake." the Rampardos extended his hand to Seven.

'_Why do I keep getting confused for an employee?_' Seven thought. "Uh sorry, I don't work here. I'm not even sure if the store is supposed to be open yet."

The Rampardos smiled and then burst out laughing "Guess I got a little too excited coming here," he said in between laughs "I'm picking up a cake for my boyfriend."

"You don't mind saying your gay to a random stranger?" Seven asked impressed. The Rampardos snickered and flexed a muscle.

"If anyone wants to try something I have these to back me up." he smiled widely. Seven rolled his eyes slightly but smiled nonetheless

"So this café has good pastries?" Seven asked, he hadn't seen any sweets or pastries of any kind while cleaning.

"The best in Alperia from what I can tell," he answered "Shame this place isn't that well known, Byron by the way." he pointed at himself.

Seven briefly debated with himself whether to introduce himself and decided that he should. "Seven Acanda," he said. Byron opened his mouth to speak but Mary came back in her uniform, her face lit up and she quickly pulled out a cake from a freezer under the counter.

"Here's your cake!" she exclaimed cheerfully "I hope everything goes perfectly!"

"Me too." Byron blushed a little "I better get going, thanks for the cake! Bye Seven!" he yelled across his shoulder. Both of them called out goodbye, once the door closed Mary began squealing in excitement.

"I just love it when people do something special for their partners!" her smile grew even bigger. She noticed Seven giving her an amused expression and the Illumise giggled into her hands "Sorry, I'm a sucker for romance."

Seven chuckled and took a seat in front of Mary. The bug type moved over to the other side of the barista and made a tea for Seven. "I don't have enough money to pay for this." Seven replied sheepishly

"On the house, especially since you took the time to help me clean the place." Seven smiled thankfully and took a sip of the tea. He hummed softly when the mint reached his taste buds "I remember you liked it."

Seven closed his eyes and only nodded as he took a sip "You seem in a better mood compared to yesterday." Mary stated with a hint of amusement in her voice.

"Had a good dream, first in a while." Seven admitted. Mary made a noise that sounded like she was content with the answer. The next minutes were spent in silence as Mary did small errands around the café and Seven drank his tea, while thinking whether he should go to the address Miss Cleo had given him. He came to the conclusion that he should, he didn't know when or if he would see Michael and Roxy today since he never told Michael where they were going to meet and he hadn't seen much of the fox yesterday.

Might as well do something productive. "I'm gonna head out now." Seven told Mary.

"Where to?" she asked. Seven pulled out the piece of paper and showed Mary to address, who in turn whistled out loud "That's the fancy part of the city, you live there?"

"I don't even live in this city I'm just going for an appointment of sorts, could you give me directions by the way?" Mary agreed and wrote down directions, Seven took the directions and said goodbye to the Illumise. She waved as Seven exited the store, and once he left she let out an enormous sigh.

'_I guess being rich isn't why he's hiding.'_ she mentally said to herself. Mary was snapped out of her thoughts as she noticed customers approaching _'Looks like I'll have to worry about that later.' _ She grabbed her notepad and went to greet her customers.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven made it to the street that had the address he needed to go to and while the fancy houses were certainly amazing they didn't compare to the wonder of the city. He now understood why Roxy had called it the city of magic.

It seemed that Mary had taken him through all the main roads, which he really didn't do but he was glad that he had this time. Apparently the city was very fond of street performances such as acrobatics, musical acts, fire breathing from non-fire types and so many more amazing acts. If he had stopped to look at even one show he probably would've stayed there until nightfall.

Finally Seven made it to the address on the paper, he looked up at the multi-storied house. It was pale blue and looked like that whoever lived in there had enough money to easily buy his hometown ten times over. Seven approached the door and knocked on an elaborate blue door. Almost immediately the door opened and a Herdier in a tuxedo stepped out.

"Ah, you're the young Serperior we've been expecting." he moved away from the door and gestured for Seven to come in "Enter sir."

Seven hesitantly stepped into the house and the Herdier swiftly closed the door and led Seven through the finely decorated halls. They stopped at the most elaborate door yet, with blue, white and gold swirls decorating the eight foot door. At this point Seven was getting uncomfortable with all the wealth around him, why the heck did Miss Cleo send him here?

"Are you feeling well young sir?" the Herdier asked. Seven snapped out of his trance and looked at the dog Pokémon.

"Uh, yes." Seven coughed and smiled awkwardly.

The normal type gave him a confused glance "I will tell my master that you have arrived sir." he said slowly. The Herdier opened and swiftly closed the door leaving Seven in the hall.

_'I think I smiled too much.'_ he thought. Seven heard muffled speech from beyond the door, he moved in closer and pressed his ear against the door.

"He is a strange one." came the muffled voice of the Herdier. Seven quickly moved back as footsteps approached the door, the Herdier opened the door and gestured for him to come in. Seven walked in but stopped in his tracks when he saw the Empoleon from yesterday.

"Hello again." Malcaray smiled warmly. Seven faked a smile as he thought that he'd mixed up the two pieces of paper "Come and have a seat, we have much to talk about."

Seven slowly walked over to the seat next to Malcaray who silently offered him a cup of tea. Seven shook his head and let his eyes wonder around the room, large furniture was placed around the room with various expensive looking objects and paintings decorating the walls.

"So what are you here for?" Malcaray asked and took a sip of his drink. Seven looked back to the older man and gave him an expression that told him to explain "I'm wondering whether you came because of me or Miss Cleo."

Surprised Seven took out the two pieces of paper and gave a dry laugh, they both had the same address written down.

"You know Miss Cleo then" Seven said, more of a statement then a question.

"The two of us have known each other for a long time," Malcary finished his drink and the Herdier came and took the cup away "She is actually the one who inspired me to start researching folklore and mythology, but we are not here to talk about me are we?"

"No," Seven shook his head "Miss Cleo said you could help me, help them? I can't understand her sometimes." Malcaray chuckled softly with his hand to his mouth. He got up from his seat and signaled for Seven to follow, they passed through a couple hallways until they reached a massive library.

"Here we can begin our session." Malcary began pulling out various books out of the shelves while Seven just stared dumbfounded. There were probably more books here than the actual Alperian library.

'You own all of this?" Seven asked looking at the book covers, everything from anatomy to myths seemed to be here.

"Me?" Malcary looked up "Oh no, I'm just housesitting for a friend." Malcaray went to a nearby table with a healthy stack of books. Seven walked over and sat in across from the Empoleon. "Do you know why you are having nightmares?"

"Yes, and no," Seven said "I know who's giving me the nightmares, but I don't know why." Malcaray nodded and pulled out a relatively short book. He opened it and stopped at a page with a very crude drawing of a Pokémon.

"Is this who is causing the nightmares?" Malcaray asked. Seven pulled the book closer to him and while the drawing was very faded and old it was clear who it was trying to show.

"They got his face wrong." Seven put the book back unto the table "But yeah, Darkrai is the one that gives me nightmares sometimes." Malcaray stared at Seven with an expressionless face. He took the book off the table and got up, he went to a nearby window while keeping his eyes on the book.

"Have you thought on why Miss Cleo sent you to me instead of doing the work herself?" he looked at Seven who shook his head. "Many Pokémon with connections to the spiritual world such as Miss Cleo and Florica have sensed that something of major importance is occurring, but since they are tied to that world they can be easily identified and targeted. Miss Cleo and Florica have sensed this many months ago, but you confirmed their suspicions with your dream."

Seven stepped up next to Malcaray and with a glazed expression began looking out the window "The world filled with shadows and horrors. I already know what that place is, because I've already been there before in real life, it shouldn't appear in anybody's dreams unless something really bad is happening to the world; right?"

"You know more than you let on don't you?" Malcaray asked softly. Seven hugged himself and nodded slightly.

"I'd be lying if I said I knew everything, or even a lot. I barely know so much and that's just because I was somewhat a part of it." Seven's voice quivered "I don't want to tell anyone about this because I don't want to put anyone in danger, I already regret telling some people especially Miss Cleo and Florica."

Seven sat on the window sill and buried his hands between his face. "Then why did you?" Malcaray asked in a calm voice.

"Desperation I guess," Seven wiped a tear with the back of his hand "I've been alone and running for a while. I've only just started talking to people again, I missed it more than I realized."

Malcary looked at the window, if he was staring outside or at his reflection Seven didn't know. After a couple more minutes of silence except for an occasional sniff from the grass type Malcaray spoke again. "You have put Pokémon in danger, intentionally or not, now you must get yourself and the Pokémon that have become entangled out of it."

**I see you made it to the end, how do I know? You're reading this, duh. Just kidding, but I do have something I want to ask you guys. Not related to the story or anything but why haven't we seen a "Fate" Pokémon? You think that with Time, Space and everything in between they'd have made something as simple as fate. Then again if they did make a Fate Pokémon they'd basically be saying that everything in the Pokémon world is already scripted, which could crush some of the magic we feel for the games.**

**My question for you is, is a Pokémon representing Fate a good idea and should Game Freak make it a thing? Leave it in a review, PM or just think quietly to yourself, anyway is good for me. **

**Bye guys! Hope you enjoyed the chapter!**


	10. Chapter 10: A Possible new Piece

Dusk's Crown Chapter 10: A Possible new Piece

**New chapter, let's get a readin'**

It had been a good hour and a half since Malcaray and Seven had talked, but Malcaray had left ,Seven asked if he could look at the books by himself. None of the books had much information other than some stories and more sketches that all looked rushed.

Seven read through all of them a couple times and still felt like he hadn't learned much. All of the stories involved Darkrai causing nightmares to other Pokémon, most being saved by a Lunar Wing except for the exception of a Liepard that was supposedly never seen again. None of them had any detail and seemed like they just wanted to say that they had been attacked for the sake of telling a story. The drawings, as mentioned before, were horribly drawn except for the one Malcaray had shown him.

And even then that one could barely pass as a rough sketch. All of them showed him as a demonic puppet of sorts, elongated arms, a thin ghostly body, flowy white hair that defied gravity, and no mouth or legs.

'_Is this how you used to look like?'_ Seven wondered. The only thing that seemed to be accurate in every picture was his eyes. The shocking blue that just seemed like they could pierce through anything. Seven closed the book and put it off to the side. He looked out the window as the clouds rolled lazily in the sky, it was strange seeing that the world looked so calm even when people felt like everything was spiraling down.

Seven heard the doors to the library open and turned to see Malcaray enter the room "Seven, I've been meaning to ask you on how you happened to stumbled upon Miss Cleo's shop?" Malcaray asked.

"I bumped into a really big Eevee," Seven recalled the event "He just happened to know what I was looking for and then ran away without saying anything else."

"Anything else?" the penguin asked. Seven looked away from Malcaray and bit his lip.

"I might have hit him with a Solarbeam, but I'm not sure. He ran into a dark alley." Malcaray seemed to ignore that bit of information as he began flipping through another book he'd just pulled out.

"It would probably be in your best interest if you could find this Eevee, for better or worse, he might have more information that could help us; Go to Miss Cleo, she is good at finding people" Malcaray said.

"That's not creepy." Seven muttered. Malcaray called for the butler and told him to show Seven out "Wait, you want me to go now?"

"That's why I called on Duncan," Malcaray answered as he sat down. "I'll see you once you've talked to the Eevee." the Herdier bowed to Malcaray and once him and Seven were out the door he silently led them out of the house .

"So are you Malcaray's butler or do you work for this house?" Seven asked attempting small talk.

"I've worked for master Malcaray since he was a small child, where he goes, I follow." he replied simply. They appeared at the door and Duncan opened the door "We hope to have your company again soon." Seven said goodbye and exited the mansion.

_**DRSDRSDRDSDRSDRS**_

Seven made it rather quickly to Miss Cleo's and Florica's shop, he didn't know his way around the city but he knew how to make it to the clock tower and the square now. He opened the door to the shop and quickly ducked as a jar hit the space where his head had been.

"Close door!" Miss Cleo yelled. Seven slammed the door and gaped at how disastrous the shop looked. The shop's elegant gypsy theme was nonexistent as books, vials, and strange items were scattered across the room in a wild frenzy.

Florica rushed past Seven but did a one-eighty when she noticed the snake. "Seven!" she said rapidly "Do you need anything?!"

"Malcaray told me to go to Miss Cleo to find an Eevee." Seven explained.

"He means me," Florica gave a dry laugh, she grabbed Seven's arm and pulled him to the back of the shop "He just doesn't like me, at all."

"What happened between you two?" Seven asked taking a seat, he put on his Lunar Wing as he saw that the Musharna was getting the same ingredients from when they took away his nightmare.

"I don't remember honestly, I just know I got him mad and now he avoids even mentioning me if he can help it." She grabbed all the ingredients and began preparing them. "It doesn't bother me, we weren't the best of friends, even before he got mad at me."

Florica ate half of the contents of the vial and moved over to Seven "You remember what I have to do right?" she asked. Seven shuddered slightly but nodded, he closed his eyes and Florica wrapped her mouth around Seven's head.

Seven immediately passed out and when he opened his eyes he was standing in the middle of nothing. Darkness completely surrounded him, he looked at his body, it was still in full color; the darkness seemingly had no effect on him.

'_I get it, it's a dreamless sleep.'_ he sat down on the ground and waited to wake up. Seven reached for his Lunar Wing but couldn't find it, he looked around but it was nowhere to be seen. _'Maybe it doesn't come into the dream world.'_ Seven thought.

Everything shook and Seven toppled over, everything shook again and Seven was pulled out of his sleep. His eyes shot open and he began coughing violently. "Drink this green one." Miss Cleo gave him a glass of water. Seven drank it down and grabbed his head at his newfound headache. "Your head will hurt for half an hour."

Seven grumbled quietly and drank the water. "Why do I remember meeting the Eevee?" Seven asked as the memory felt like it was burning into his skull "Wasn't I supposed to forget about it?"

"That is when memory is removed," Miss Cleo explained "Ingredients are used to recover memory when Miss Cleo and Florica finish job, nightmare dream in bottle over there." the psychic type pointed to a black bottle that was standing in the center of a nearby table.

"I'll track down the Eevee in a little Seven," Florica rushed through the room "Give me a couple of minutes, okay?" Seven nodded and grabbed his head in pain. His head was doing a lot more than just hurting.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

Seven cut through the streets in a light jog, he'd rather run but his head was still hurting. Florica found the Eevee's general location, apparently since Seven had no ties with the Eevee it was impossible to find an exact location.

Now he was trying to get there before the Eevee moved to another area. Seven slowed to a walk as he made it to a street filled with graffiti, but they were all phosphorescent drawings of Pokémon dancing and overall having a good time. Seven slowed down to a walk to admire to pictures more. It seemed weird that all these pictures were so hidden, no one seemed to be around and now that he was taking a better look they needed a bit of repair.

Two minutes later Seven finally spotted the Eevee looking at one of the pictures. Seven broke into a jog before he stopped right in his tracks. "Holy Arceus, what happened to you?" Seven breathed in. The Eevee was covered in bandages on various parts of his body.

"You hit me with a Solarbeam, remember?" the Eevee replied bluntly "Are you here to attack me again?"

"No, no, no!" Seven waved his hands "I just wanted to find you, I need your help."

"Why? So you can-," the normal type stopped mid-sentence "Your eyes just turned blue for a second."

Seven's eyes widened as he looked around him "Run, now!" Seven grabbed his hand and pulled the Eevee into a lit alleyway. He turned to the other Pokémon and looked him in the eye

"I'm going to be honest, and say we might die right now," Seven whispered rapidly "I'm sorry I hit you with a Solarbeam."

"I think an apology is the least of our problems right now." he whispered back. They both stopped talking as they heard footsteps approaching them, Seven opened his hand and summoned a Leaf Blade. He bent his legs and in a swift movement he turned to face his enemy and attacked.

**Cliffhanger yes, kill me. Just keep in mind that you aren't the first to try and will not be the last!**


	11. Chapter 11: The Blue Eyed Man

Dusk's Crown Chapter 11: The Blue Eyed Man

Seven opened his eyes and found himself standing in a forest, normally he'd freak out about being in an entirely new location out of nowhere, but the trees here were familiar, he knew this place.

"This is the forest close to home," Seven whispered to himself, "How did I get here?" the snake summoned a Leaf Blade, just as a precaution. He began slowly making his way through the woods, leaving himself on high alert in case anything tried to jump him.

The forest was illuminated enough so that seeing wasn't too much of a strain on Seven's eyes, the moon always did illuminate these woods easily. After a minute of walking Seven's ears suddenly twitched, he heard faint crying coming from up ahead; he walked towards the crying and hid behind a tree when he figured he was close enough to the source of the sound, he peering around the tree and noticed a small Kirlia crying under a tree.

Seven stopped himself from walking towards the Kirlia, as much as he wanted to help, he did appear in this forest out of nowhere, for all he knew none of this was real.

"Somebody help, please!" the little girl cried out. Flashes of light bounced off the girl's wrist, causing a mini light show in the process. Seven saw a small green bracelet with five silver hearts hanging from it.

"Mom?" Seven gasped. The bracelet was an exact replica of his mom's bracelet, but that would mean that this was either seeing something from the past, or he was having a really weird dream.

The girl looked up and a small gasp escaped her lips, Seven whipped his head around and spotted Darkrai in the darkness. Seven raised his sword and pointed it at Darkrai, ready for a fight, but Darkrai floated past Seven and stopped in front of the girl.

"W-where are your legs?" asked the little girl, obviously freaking out. Darkrai looked down at himself and let his legs slide out of his body. A pathetic squeak came out of the Kirlia and she hid her face behind her hands, Seven shuddered as well, Darkrai's old body was scary sometimes. Then Darkrai slowly, almost cautiously, offered his hand to the girl.

She peeked through her hands, and finally turned up to look at Darkrai, then back to the offered hand. She timidly grabbed his hand, Darkrai softly tightened his grip on her hand and helped her unto her feet. "Are you going to take me home?" she asked. Darkrai only answered with an almost expressionless gaze, then he looked away and began walking.

They spent the next ten minutes walking in silence, with Seven trailing behind them quietly. "My name is Serah, what's yours?" asked the young girl, Darkrai quickly glanced at her but gave no response, "Ok then, do you have any food?" Darkrai stopped walking, Serah stopped too and looked up in confusion. She was met with Darkrai looking confused and uncomfortable

"You're not afraid of me?" he asked.

"You're taking me home right?" asked Serah asked again, Darkrai responded with a short nod, "Then nope, a bad guy wouldn't take me home."

The two spent the next thirty minutes walking through the forest, Serah holding a one sided conversation with Darkrai, though it didn't look like he minded at all. Throughout the walk Serah talked about almost everything, her school, her friends, her huge fixation on candy and many other topics.

"You're a good listener, no one listens to me, just David, but sometimes he gets bored." Serah looked up to see if he was paying attention, Darkrai was half looking at the road and half listening. "You should learn to talk."

More time had passed when Serah spotted a road sign that said '_Amity Glades'_ "We're here!" she yelled, she let go of Darkrai's hand and ran ahead, giggling and smiling in her rush to get home. She ran for a couple of minutes until she spotted a Servine near the edge of the forest, "David, I'm here!" Serah yelled. The Servine spun around at the sound of Serah's voice and ran towards her once he spotted her among the trees, Serah jumped into his arms as David embraced her in a tight hug.

"Serah! Where were you, everyone in town is looking for you!" David exclaimed.

"I'm sorry," Serah apologized, looking down in embarrassment, "I ran off into the woods and got lost, I couldn't find my way back, but this man came and saved me. He's right-" Serah turned back around towards the forest, but Darkrai wasn't behind her anymore, "here?". Seven stood ten feet away from the scene, he watched how Darkrai had stepped back into the trees and almost disappeared into the scenery before David had noticed him.

"But he was right here, he was big, he had blue eyes!" Serah began stammering.

"Serah," David grabbed the Kirlia's attention, "I believe you, but we should get back, everyone is worried about you." David tugged on Serah's hand and pulled back towards Amity Glades, Serah turned back towards the forest hoping to get another glimpse of Darkrai, but she couldn't find him through the darkness of the trees.

Seven smiled, if all of this was real then he was glad he gotten to see it, his mom had told this story so many times. He turned around to look at Darkrai but the dark type was nowhere to be seen. Seven quickly turned around, expecting Darkrai to be behind him, but was met with a room, he looked around and saw that he wasn't in the forest anymore, but was now in a room that he recognized.

"This is mom's room," Seven thought out loud, "But it looks . . . different." without warning a Gardevoir wearing a wedding dress burst into the room with a crowd of Pokémon trying to catch up to her, she spun on her heel and slammed the door shut.

"Just give me a few minutes!" she yelled, "I need to . . . get some last minute stuff ready!" Serah walked over to the dresser and stared into the mirror attached to it, ignoring the people who were trying to convince her to come out of the room. "It's your big day today," she said to herself, "You're ready, you're calm, you're collected." She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

"Oh who am I kidding, I'm shitting myself here." She sighed and let herself fall on a stool, readjusting her wedding dress so she wouldn't wrinkle it. "Arceus, what am I going to do?" she moaned putting her head between her hands. She moved the hair out of her eyes and looked into the mirror. Her delicate features and green hair were being complimented with the crispness and elegance of the wedding dress. She grabbed her charm bracelet from the dresser and put it on, everyone had told her that the old worn out thing wouldn't fit with the dress, she argued that it was her wedding night and she could do what she wanted; but she gave into their demands and had spent the entire day without her partner's gift, one of today's many regrets. She tore her gaze away from her charm and back to her reflection, immediately she noticed someone in the background and stood up to face the intruder. Serah was ready to smack the person but stopped herself when she noticed who it was, standing there was Darkrai, virtually unchanged after all these years.

"It's you," Serah breathed, "Do you remember me?" she asked. Darkrai only nodded. "You're just as talkative as I remember." Serah smiled sweetly, Darkrai pointed towards Serah's dress, his expression asking for an explanation.

"It's my wedding dress, I made it myself." She spun around quickly, the dress spinning in a graceful arc alongside her.

"Wedding?" Darkrai asked. Serah giggled at his response, but stopped when she realized he was serious.

"Well, it's a ceremony that two people have when they want to make their love eternal, and spend the rest of their lives together. They make a vow to each other, give each other rings and then seal their promise with a kiss."

"Then why are you not there?" Darkrai asked. Serah looked back at the door, everyone had given up getting her out of the room.

"I don't . . . I don't know to be honest." She gently turned around and looked into the mirror again, "You know, I never got to thank you after all these years. If it weren't for you I might've never found my way out after all those days in the woods, I could've died." Serah turned around again and walked towards Darkrai, she looked him in the eyes and grabbed both of his hands.

"If it weren't for you I wouldn't have seen my family again, I wouldn't have opened my candy shop, I wouldn't have fallen in love with David. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. I love everything that's happened to me, and I love everything that's going to happen! I'm going to do it! I'm going up to that alter and shit myself with pride."

"Shit, yourself?" Darkrai asked, now completely confused, he was perplexed at the sudden shift of emotions. Serah laughed awkwardly and let go of his hands.

"Ignore me, I'm just being dumb; thank you, looks like you saved me twice now, I owe you big time." Darkrai shook his head, Serah gently swatted his shoulder in response, "Don't say that, you'll always have a home here if you ever want it, I promise. David would love it, he was the only one who believed me about you anyways."

Darkrai extended his hand, offering it to Serah. The Gardevoir laughed at Darkrai and swatted the hand away, she stepped forward and embraced him in a warm hug.

"Would you like to come to the wedding with me, as my guest of honor?" Darkrai unwound from the hug and shook his head, "You sure, we have cake." She tried to convince Darkrai as she wiggled her eyebrows, Darkrai shook his head again. Serah pouted slightly but nodded, "That's okay, well, wish me luck." She picked up her dress and walked towards the door.

"Good luck." Darkrai said. Serah opened the door and flashed a quick smile to Darkrai, she took a deep breath and walked out of the room. Darkrai stared at the door for a couple seconds, motionless, then he began slowly turning his face the other side of the room. Exactly where Seven was standing.

Seven moved his arm to point his sword towards Darkrai, but the leaf blade wasn't in his hands. Seven looked back at Darkrai, the dark type was making direct eye contact with him. Slowly, Seven tried forming another sword; Darkrai noticed and his blue eyes exploded into a fiery red, his mouth ripped open into a giant chasm of sharp teeth and he let out a blood curdling roar. Seven yelled in horror as the demonic Darkrai charged towards him with a killer intent.

Seven woke up screaming, the sudden light blinding him. He felt arms wrap around him and began screaming even louder and tried to break free.

"Seven, calm down, it's me Exodus!" the ghost yelled. Seven stopped flailing and screaming and let his vision adjust to the bright light, Exodus was grabbing unto him, a look of worry painted across his face; behind him Seto was standing at the doorway.

"It was a nightmare." Seven murmured, Exodus smiled softly and embraced Seven. The snake was caught off guard by the hug, but soon wrapped his arms tight around Exodus.

"Do you need to talk about it?" Exodus asked, Seven shook his head and tightened his grip on Exodus.

"What're you doing here Seto?" Seven asked after a couple of minutes of hugging Exodus.

"After you dragged me to that corner and randomly lashed out, Exodus dodged your sword and used Hypnosis on you. I helped him carry you here, you said you wanted to talk so I decided to stay here. I like it here, it's quiet."

"Seven, I think we need to talk." Exodus whispered. "Seto, can I ask you to help me organize some berries?" Seto nodded and walked out of the room

"Okay, I'm listening." Seven said.

"Look, I know that I'm not related to you and what you do isn't exactly my business, but I'm worried about you. You spend the entire day running around the city, spend time with people you don't know, I don't even know why you can't be in the dark; and from what I saw today, it looks you're not above attacking someone, for whatever reasons." Seven opened his mouth but Exodus held up his hand. "I'm not done yet. While I'm not proud to admit it, I've followed you around the city a couple of times, all you do is go from point A to point B, there's no admiring the scenery, no looking at what's around you, almost like you're not feeling anything. I checked up on you last night when you were asleep, and you were smiling, something you don't do much when you're awake; Seven, if you're going to live here in my shop, for however long it is, then I want to know, well, everything."

"Everything?" Seven repeated, almost like a challenge.

"Well, maybe not everything, but the important things would be nice." The ghost scratched his chin. Seven nodded, pushing himself off the bed, he walked over to the small desk that decorated the room.

"My name is Seven Amaranthus, the seventh kid of my family. My mom is a Gardevoir named Serah and my dad is a Serperior named David. Before you ask why I'm not with them, that's mostly because of my dad. He was a drug addict, not really his fault though, some bastards tied him down and injected him with the drug; their way of getting new clients, the police caught him but the damage was done. He was a good man, I remember that, but after the drugs he became angry, always irritated. Violent. It always looked like I was his favorite punching bag, I have scars to prove it. Anyways, one day, it got really bad, it was the worst I've ever seen him, he got so mad, he could've killed me if I hadn't evolved. And then, I started running, I ran, and I ran, and I ran until I couldn't run anymore and I collapsed on the ground unable to move. That's when I met him."

"Him?" Exodus interrupted the story. Seven nodded and ran his fingers along the desk.

"Darkrai," Seven smiled softly, nostalgia filling up inside him, Exodus paled but kept quiet, "At first I thought death himself had come for me, but he took me to a safe place and brought me food and water until I got my energy back. We talked throughout the night and that's when I decided that I wasn't going to go back home, I wasn't going back to a place where I was being abused and mistreated, I wanted to see what the world had to offer. Darkrai agreed to come with me and we spent the next five months going from place to place. I met a lot of people in my travels, including my best friend Blaze." Seven's smile faded and was replaced by a serious expression, "then one day he suddenly changed, he attacked Blaze and me, we tried fighting, but we lost. Blaze told me to run and . . . I did. Darkrai found me multiple times throughout the next week, none of them ended well. That's when I learned everything that I did, don't stand in darkness, always keep moving, be careful who you trust, always wear my Lunar Wing when I go to sleep." Seven reached for the necklace but it wasn't around his neck, he looked at Exodus who gave him an apologetic look.

"And how he can't find me in real life even if he finds me in my dreams. He told me that the dream world works different than the real world, I'm guessing that's why he never appears in person after he appears in my dreams."

"When you attacked me earlier today, did you think I was Darkrai?" Exodus asked. Seven nodded and finally looked at the ghost.

"My eyes flash blue whenever Darkrai appears, I don't know why but it happens without fail. The fact that they turned blue is that he either knows where I am or knows that I'm in this city, but seeing that he hasn't barged in here yet I'm guessing it's the latter."

"Oh boy." Exodus murmured underneath his breath. "Can I ask another question? What's Darkrai to you?"

"What do you mean." Seven asked, trying to avoid the question.

"Is he a close friend, are you enemies, do you hate him, do you love him?" Exodus emphasized heavily the last one.

"I'm sixteen, what do I know about love?" Seven answered quickly, "But he means a lot to me, that's for sure." Exodus put his hand on Seven's shoulder and squeezed it, Seven turned towards him and smiled appreciatively. "Can I ask a question now?" Exodus nodded. "How come you're being so nice to me, and still willing to help after all I just said?"

Exodus blushed deeply and scractched his chin, "Well you've been honest with me, so I'll be honest with you. I, I always wanted a son, but I can't have any because I'm infertile. When you came here and asked for a place to stay, I guess I just wanted to see if I could be like a dad for a little." Exodus chuckled awkwardly.

"Well you're doing better than what my real dad did." Seven offered, Exodus gave him a thankful smile. "Well I got something I've got to do real quick." Seven gave Exodus a quick hug and opened the door, he walked into the store and spotted the Eevee at the front of the store "Seto, do you mind if I asked you some questions?" Seven made his way to the Eevee who had taken a seat behind the counter.

"Of course not." Seto answered politely.

"When I bumped into you the first time we met, and you told me about the folklore shop, how did you know what I wanted to find." Seven asked putting his hands on the counter

"I, used Mind Reader, I don't like using it but I let my guard down when we bumped into each other and it accidently happened, I'm sorry."

"So you don't know anything about me." Seven asked.

"I'm sorry, but I don't have any answers." Seto replied sadly. Seven pushed himself off the counter and sighed.

"Well, thank you anyways, sorry again about hitting you with a Solarbeam." The snake apologized. Seto smiled timidly and nodded. Exodus walked over to the two of them and patted Seven's back.

"You'll find what you're looking for, don't worry." He reassured Seven.

Seven nodded, despite everything that was happening, at that moment, he felt good.

_**DRSDRSDRSDRSDRSDRS**_

"Hey! I want my phone call!" a Slyveon yelled as he rattled a plastic cup against the metal bars, "I know some of my rights!"

"Not again! Shut up already!" a Drapion guard yelled, extremely annoyed, he stomped towards the cell and took the cup from the Slyveon's hands. "You don't get a phone call, now shut the fuck up."

"Maybe I'd shut up if you just gave me my damn phone call, or does shitty service come along that shitty brain of yours." the Slyveon jumped back just in time to avoid getting his face clawed off by the Drapion. "Bad fighting skills seem to be part of the package to." he muttered.

"I swear I am going to kill you if you don't shut up," the Drapion threatened through his teeth, "I don't care if they fucking kill me for it."

"You can't kill me, I 'have a role in the unveiling of key events, and my life serves a purpose'" the Slyveon recited, clearly mimicking someone, "Arceus, your boss monologues so much I'm surprised he didn't develop a pulmonary issue."

"Just go to sleep, save me the headaches and the urge to bash your face in." the Drapion ordered, walking away from the cells. The Slyveon ran up to the bars and pushed himself against them as much as he could.

"You can't tell Blaze the Slyveon what to do! The only people who can do that are my parents and the government!" his screams went unheard as the door to the prison area closed, leaving Blaze all alone. The fairy sighed and sat on the only piece of furniture in the cell, a wooden bench chained to the wall. "How are you going to get yourself out of this one Blazey?"

He looked up to the tiny gap that let all the light in; it was a golden color, the sun would set soon, and the cell would be completely dark, again. Leaving him alone in the cold, suffocating darkness "Seven, you owe me big time when I get out of here." Blaze clasped his hands together and blew into them, trying to warm himself up a bit.

**Well, this took a long time. I figured I won't make excuses anymore, those of you who read know why I can't write and making promises that I'll post more frequently when I can't is not fair to you. With that said however I do want to bring something up.**

**I will not be writing for DC until I finish my other story, buuuuuut, that story is fast to write, the only reason I don't post as often is because this story takes so much time to write. So after I finish Quality Time I'll have more time, no pun intended, for this plus another project I have planned.**

**RWBY fans how you doing.**

**That will be all for now, I thank all of you reading and I bid you adieu.**

**P.S. PLOT CONVENIENCE EEVEE MY ASS!**


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